


searching for a sweet surrender

by fruits



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: 18x18, Alternate Universe - High School, M/M, also this has side malum btw, everyone is kinda mentioned in this fic also ashton's family has a few lines here and there, luke and michael go to a different school than calum and ash, swim team au!!!!, there is so much pining in this?????, uhhh and i can't think of anything else????
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 13:58:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3070733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fruits/pseuds/fruits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Michael said you’re the best guy on this team. That you’re our biggest competition. He said that you’ve won every single event you’ve competed in since you got to high school,” Luke replied, his voice dropping lower as he spoke.</p><p>Ashton didn’t know how to respond, so he didn’t. All of it was technically true, although he would argue differently about being the biggest competition. There were plenty of events he wasn’t competing in.</p><p>“But he failed to mention how hot you were.”</p><p>or, ashton doesn’t get involved in relationships during swim season because they’re distracting and luke hemmings might just change that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	searching for a sweet surrender

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jackhemmings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jackhemmings/gifts).



> this fic fulfills [archiveofluke’s](http://archiveofluke.tumblr.com) prompt from their 5sos secret santa wishlist: _”i just really need a lashton high school au and thats all im saying”_ i should preface this by saying that i know nothing about swimming bUT i got emo when i found out both ashton and luke were on their respective swim teams growing up and this is basically a hs au of them on swim teams however, there is a suspicious lack of actual swimming in this fic so i hope that’s ok lol  
>  i also incorporated 18x18 which is one of my FAVORITE lashton things so imagine [this](http://31.media.tumblr.com/56328897020cc2662afdf9d263c7d924/tumblr_nellvrJbqU1tvvjrfo4_250.gif) luke with [this](http://31.media.tumblr.com/ec7d39df940a10ae8b08a26faece3fa6/tumblr_mukbwahPes1rpguako4_r1_250.gif) ashton while you read this!!! (also [this](http://noahshaw.tumblr.com/post/105750505636) was a constant point of reference for me) obviously luke is aged up and there isn’t an age difference and pretend their birthdays are in the fall bc this fic starts off in january and they’re just getting back to school from winter holidays!  
> title of the fic from i’m a mess by ed sheeran

Ashton had been totally unfocused all day. But, it was seven in the morning and he’d only been awake for three hours. He didn’t think it was fair to ask anyone to focus this early. Ever. 

It was partially his fault, though.

His swim meet started in an hour and he didn’t have a choice but to be awake. They had warm-ups in fifteen minutes and he was too restless to sit around his house. His mom happily drove him to the natatorium and happily drove right back so she could sleep for another thirty minutes. She’d wake up his siblings and they would get dressed while they were half-awake and make their way back here for his events.

He was only in two today, thank God. Backstroke and breaststroke. And he only had thirty minutes in between each event, which meant he would get them over with. He wished he didn’t have to stay here to cheer on the rest of his teammates after, but that was part of his obligation.

He loved swimming. He basically lived and breathed it. But right now, he was hiding his exhaustion the best he could. It helped that he was slightly nervous, which kept him slightly more alert and awake. He muffled yawns underneath a hand, trying not to show how tired he really was.

He did shoot a dirty look over at Calum, though. It was also partially the dark-haired boy’s fault Ashton was yawning, too.

“I can feel your glaring. That isn’t going to help your hangover,” Calum muttered, looking over at Ashton out of the corner of his eye.

That only made Ashton glare harder. “I’m not hungover, idiot. I didn’t even drink last night.”

“Whatever,” Calum mumbled, scrubbing both of his hands over his face.

“You’re the one who’s hungover. Don’t know why you had the brilliant idea to get shitfaced the night before a meet,” Ashton replied, his voice as quiet as Calum’s. They would be overheard if they spoke any louder. Or Ashton might make Calum’s headache worse. Probably both.

Calum groaned quietly, leaning his elbows onto his knees, his head in his hands.

“I can’t help it. He’s just _so_ cute, like, I can’t say no to him,” Calum said, his words muffled by his hands.

Ashton tried not to roll his eyes.

“I don’t know why either of you decided to get drunk last night. Michael has to be here soon, too,” Ashton said. And, as he searched around the building until he found the giant clock on the wall, he realized that Michael should probably already be here.

“I know, but,” Calum replied, letting out a small sigh before continuing. “You don’t get it. I never get to see him and when I do it’s, like, I want to impress him so much.”

“And you think drinking excessively is the way to do that?” Ashton asked incredulously.

Calum groaned again, clearly annoyed.

“No, there are other things I do,” Calum grumbled, his lips forming into a pout, but Ashton had already started smirking.

Calum looked over at him, still frowning.

“You know, you could have gone home last night. You didn’t have to stay at the party until I wanted to go,” Calum pointed out.

He was right, of course. Actually, there were several moments last night when Ashton was two seconds away from leaving. The first was the moment he walked into the door. The second was when a girl barely missed barfing all over his shoes. The third was when the rest of his friends, including Calum, ditched him to try and hook up with someone else. He was certain that Calum was the only unsuccessful one.

“Don’t know when you’re going to give up on him. He’s clearly leading you on,” Ashton said, giving Calum a pointed look.

Calum sighed again, starting to look sad and Ashton felt a little bad for saying it. He had no filter this early in the morning.

“I know. I _know_. But I really like him, Ash. He _is_ a nice guy. I wish you’d actually take the time to talk to him,” Calum stated.

“I do talk to him. He doesn’t seem very interested in talking to me. Or you, for that matter,” Ashton said, trying to keep the agitation out of his voice.

Calum didn’t say anything in response.

“I’m trying to look out for you. It’s hard to watch sometimes,” Ashton softened, biting the inside of his lip.

Calum still didn’t say anything.

So Ashton looked over at him, concerned by the lack of response. But he turned just in time to see Calum sit up a bit higher, his eyes widening as he stared off across the natatorium.

Ashton followed his gaze.

 _Oh, of course_ , Ashton thought to himself. Speak of the devil.

Ashton had been thinking that Michael should get here soon, so it was no surprise that Calum’s full attention was on the dirty blonde boy the second he walked into the door. Ashton couldn’t help but roll his eyes then.

Ashton just didn’t get it. Calum wasn’t the only one who was enamored by Michael. Girls and boys all draped themselves over him to get his attention. Maybe Michael was a little cute, but not _that_ cute, at least to Ashton. Calum looked at Michael like he put the damn stars in the sky, so maybe Ashton was the one missing something.

Ashton was sure that was why Michael barely paid any attention to Calum. He had so many other people surrounding him all the time that he just assumed Calum would always be there for him. It just wasn’t fair. Ashton wished Calum would stop asking him to like Michael - Ashton didn’t like people who saw others as dispensable. Calum was so much more than a pretty face to flirt with whenever Michael was bored.

“How does he look that good after getting completely wasted the night before? I don’t get it,” Calum whined, tugging on the hair at the back of his neck. “I look like actual shit.”

Ashton looked away from Michael for a moment to look back at Calum. “You’re about to get in the pool for warm-ups, it’s not gonna matter what you look like.”

Calum made a face which Ashton interpreted as _please shut up_.

Ashton didn’t say anything else. Instead, he looked back over in the direction of Michael and his team.

Ashton and Calum’s team was competing against a bunch of schools in the area today and Michael’s was one of them. Ashton’s school had won the championships for the last four years. Michael’s had finished second.

The two schools had a pretty big rivalry when it came to most sports, but swimming was probably the most competitive. Ashton didn’t really care about school-related drama, or whatever. Everyone out there was a competitor and he had to beat them all when it came down to it. It didn’t matter what team they were on.

“Oh, fuck. That must be the new kid that Michael was talking about last night,” Calum said, his voice dropping down to right above a whisper.

Ashton looked around, noticing a few familiar faces from the previous years. But there were so many people on the other team that he had no idea which one Calum was talking about.

“The blonde one. Tall. _Really_ tall. Like, super tall. Jesus, Ash. To your left. How can you not see him?” Calum did literally everything but point at the guy.

But really, Ashton wasn’t sure _how_ he had missed him now that he was looking at him.

It was a little ridiculous how tall this guy actually was. Ashton’s gaze had completely skipped over him before and he hadn’t known why.

He couldn’t take his eyes off of him as the boy walked over to Michael. The two started talking, smiling at each other and then laughing.

Ashton’s heart squeezed in his chest as he watched the boy smile. It was alarming, actually.

Because this guy was, like, really gorgeous. It almost wasn’t fair.

The more he smiled and the more he laughed at whatever Michael was saying, the more Ashton felt repeated pangs in his chest.

“Michael said he’s the best guy on their team. He actually wouldn’t shut up about him last night,” Calum continued, also staring at the two boys across the room as they talked to each other. “Think his name is Luke if I remember correctly.”

Luke.

Ashton would definitely have to remember that.

Other than the fact that he was blonde, extremely tall, and had a perfect smile, Ashton couldn’t see much else about him. Luke was still dressed in his team gear, the matching jacket and sweatpants, just like Ashton was. He was sure once those items of clothing came off, he would have a completely new opinion on Luke.

Ashton was startled out of his staring by his coach’s whistle blowing. Warm-ups.

Ashton, Calum, and the rest of their team stood up in unison. Everyone moved at their own pace removing their team uniforms, revealing their swim gear underneath. Ashton shoved his clothes in his duffle bag, taking out his goggles and swim cap before heading over to the pool.

He waited for Calum to join him by their respective lanes. If he could help it, Ashton always preferred swimming next to Calum. In some weird way that he didn’t know how to explain, it always made him feel better. More comfortable somehow.

Calum walked until he was directly next to him, his eyes staring at something behind Ashton. There was probably only one guess as to who it was.

“That Luke guy is staring at you,” Calum whispered as he pulled the swim cap onto his head, a smirk gracing his features as he looked back at Ashton.

Ashton did everything he could not to turn around, but ultimately failed.

He tried to do it sneakily - the whole, stretching behind him and twisting his body side to side. The second he turned around, though, his eyes met Michael’s who gave him a similar smirk to Calum’s. His eyes didn’t stay there long as they drifted to Luke, who yes. Was definitely staring at him.

“Irwin! Hood! Are you going to join us today?” their coach yelled, both of the boys whipping their heads around to give their coach sheepish looks. Their coach gestured to the pool with an _any day now_ expression.

Ashton hurriedly stepped onto his starting block and got into position. He dove in within a matter of seconds.

As the warm-ups continued, he could feel himself loosening up, the nerves slowly leaving his body. If he didn’t have to concentrate on it, when he wasn’t just sitting around waiting for everything to happen, he felt better. But he couldn’t take his mind off of Luke the entire time, which was a problem. It’s like he could still feel the boy’s gaze on him as he continued to swim and he wasn’t sure if it was his imagination or not.

He got out of the pool a few minutes later and immediately made his way to his towel, tugging his swim cap and goggles off.

Calum wasn’t far behind him.

The two of them sat back down, remaining quiet for a few moments before talking again. Even though Calum was extremely hungover, it seemed like he was slowly gaining life back into him. It probably had something to do with nerves. He was competing in more events today than Ashton was, so if that was the reason, Ashton sympathized.

Calum abruptly stopped mid-sentence as he stared off at something, his eyes growing wider once again.

Ashton knew it was Michael, probably shirtless or something. He was about to look off in the same direction when he heard his name called.

He turned in the direction of the voice, seeing his mom and siblings approach him. Actually, it was more like his mom was dragging the two kids, having to keep them standing or else they’d fall over from being half-asleep, just as he expected. He was sure Lauren and Harry hated him right about now.

“Hi, how did warm-ups go?” his mom asked, giving him a small kiss on his cheek. She didn’t give Ashton a chance to answer before she addressed his best friend. “Hi, Calum. How are you doing sweetheart?”

Calum gave her his best smile, beaming up at her from the bleachers. “I’m good, Ms. Irwin. You look great this morning.”

Ashton glared at Calum while his mom laughed softly. “Thank you, dear. Good luck at your events today.”

Calum nodded his thanks, continuing to smile at Ashton’s mom.

“Warm-ups were fine. You should probably get them to their seats before they pass out,” he said, gesturing at his siblings. Lauren’s eyes were already drifting shut as she leaned against their mom while Harry continuously yawned and rubbed his eyes.

Ashton’s mom gave him one last hug and a whispered _good luck_ before heading into the bleachers.

The events began not long after that. His first one was soon, so he didn’t get to sit and watch for very long. As he made his way over to the pool to wait for his event, he realized that he never figured out what Calum had been staring at.

He waited off to the side, the rest of the competitors in his event gathering with him. Some of them talked amongst each other, but Ashton didn’t. He didn’t know anyone and he really didn’t want to. There was no purpose in befriending the competition at this point. They wouldn’t want to talk to him again if he came out on top anyway. He wasn’t cocky enough to think he would, but he was pretty confident in his backstroke. The hope, of course, was that he would win.

A few seconds later, however, he did feel a presence next to him. An awfully close presence.

“Hi,” the presence said, the voice deep and _really_ close to his ear.

He barely turned his head a fraction before he realized who it was. And then he completely turned his head, coming face to face with someone he hadn’t expected.

“Hi,” Ashton replied, giving the boy an inquisitive look. He didn’t know why he was responding - the last thing he wanted was to start a conversation with Luke. He didn’t need that kind of distraction right now.

“My name’s Luke,” he said, giving Ashton a wide smile, the same one Ashton had seen him give Michael when he first saw him.

“Ashton,” he responded, trying to give his best close-lipped smile in return.

Luke nodded, continuing to smile. “Michael told me. He said he knew you and that, uh, guy you were sitting with.”

But Ashton’s eyes had drifted down slightly, suddenly realizing that Luke wasn’t fully dressed anymore, and he hardly heard a single word the other boy was saying now. Ashton was often complimented about how he had the perfect swimmer’s body. Long arms, long torso, long everything. But he knew that none of that was true now that he was staring at Luke.

The boy’s wide shoulders and slim waist screamed that he was a swimmer. He was fit, too, not a single inch of his body out of shape. Of course the first thing he noticed was the boy’s height, but that was just a bonus.

Ashton swallowed loudly, pleading with his body not to react while he was standing in front of Luke. Or at all. Now really wasn’t the time to get a hard-on.

“You okay?” Luke asked, his expression apprehensive as he looked at Ashton.

Ashton vigorously nodded, his gaze moving back up to Luke’s eyes and forcing himself not to look anywhere else.

“Yeah, sorry. Zoned out there,” he waved it off like it happened a lot, which in all honesty, probably made him look like an idiot. But it was better than admitting he’d been lost in checking out Luke’s body, or wondering what it would feel like to touch the boy, let his hands run over every inch of him.

Ashton really needed to lose that train of thought, like, right now.

“I was just saying that I’m new to the team. Well, actually, to this whole place. My family moved here a few weeks ago. Over winter holidays,” Luke explained.

Ashton was eating up any and all information that Luke was giving him here, filing it away for later. Swimmer, new to town, hot, tall, hot. He’d make sure he didn’t forget.

“Kinda sucks that you got here in the middle of the season,” Ashton said, referring to swimming. The season started in September and would end in March. There wasn’t much time left at all.

“I know,” Luke replied, nodding his head. “We were doing so well at my old school, too.” Ashton watched as Luke’s face turned sad, a tiny frown forming on his lips.

Ashton wanted to kiss it off of him.

“Your team is doing really well now, though. If you’re as good as Michael says, then you guys will be great,” Ashton said, shrugging his shoulders as he finished speaking. He didn’t know why he felt the need to comfort Luke - he probably shouldn’t have been saying that their team would do well at all. But he didn’t want the boy to be discouraged, especially if this was his first time competing with a new team. Ashton knew how nerve-wracking it was.

Ashton watched as Luke started smiling, giving Ashton a slightly confused look while he did it.

Ashton’s eyebrows pulled together, wondering why the boy was looking at him like that.

“What?” he asked, starting to squirm as he stood there, Luke’s facial expression unchanging.

Luke let out a breathy laugh, one that caused Ashton’s heart to squeeze. He wanted to hear it again, a thousand times.

“You just said Michael said I was good?” Luke finally spoke, the sentence turning into a question. “How did you…”

And Ashton immediately wanted to slap himself. Of course he just admitted that he’d been talking about Luke before they met. And, like, it wouldn’t have been so bad if he hadn’t already pretended like he didn’t know who Luke was a few moments ago. But he had and now Luke was looking at him with that cute and knowing look on his face, expecting an answer.

“Oh, um,” he stammered, moving a hand to rub awkwardly at the back of his neck. “Calum told me. My best friend. The, um, guy I was talking to earlier. Michael told him.”

Ashton felt his face heating up, too, and honestly, he never blushed and this was so embarrassing that he almost thought about jumping in that pool right this second to avoid this conversation. And to cool off a bit.

All Luke did was continue to smile, that stupid knowing expression on his face.

“So, I guess we’ve both heard a few things about each other,” Luke said, biting on his lip after he finished speaking.

Ashton’s managed to look sheepish, his fingers beginning to tug on his swim cap.

“What else did Calum tell you?” Luke asked.

Ashton shrugged. “That was it, really. He said Michael told him you’re new, but you’re the best guy on the team.”

Luke beamed, obviously surprised by hearing what Michael had to say about him. Ashton tried not to bristle at the fact that Luke cared what Michael thought. So instead of saying something snarky about Michael like he wanted to, Ashton remained quiet.

“Don’t you want to know what I’ve heard about you?” Luke questioned, the look on his face turning hopeful.

Truthfully, the curiosity was killing Ashton. Of course he wanted to know. That didn’t mean he was going to appear eager about it, though.

He shrugged again. “Sure.”

Luke still smiled, taking a small step closer to Ashton, as if he was about to tell him a secret.

“Michael said you’re the best guy on this team. That you’re our biggest competition. He said that you’ve won every single event you’ve competed in since you got to high school,” Luke replied, his voice dropping lower as he spoke.

Ashton didn’t know how to respond, so he didn’t. All of it was technically true, although he would argue differently about being the biggest competition. There were plenty of events he wasn’t competing in.

“But he failed to mention how hot you were.”

Ashton was sure he’d heard Luke incorrectly. Like, he had a pretty overactive imagination sometimes, so it would totally make sense if he’d made that last sentence up in his head.

But the more Ashton stared at Luke, Luke’s face still hopeful, like he was waiting for Ashton to say something, Ashton knew he hadn’t heard wrong.

He blushed again, positive that he looked like a tomato.

“I, uh, that’s. You don’t really mean that,” Ashton stuttered, not able to hide how disbelieving he was.

Luke raised an eyebrow. “Pretty sure I do.”

Ashton was floored. This hadn’t been what he was expecting.

Before Ashton had a chance to say anything, the swimmers that were gathered around the two boys began making their way to the starting blocks, signaling that their event was about to begin. This obviously halted any further conversation Ashton could have with Luke at the moment.

Ashton shook these distracting thoughts out of his mind as he stretched his arms one last time, stepping forward toward the block in his lane. He did, however, notice that Luke was in the lane directly to his right. He didn’t have time to address how he felt about that.

He pulled his goggles down over his eyes, jumping in the pool to get in his starting position for the backstroke event. The second the buzzer sounded, signaling the start of the race, Ashton took off, no longer thinking about anything else but swimming.

***

Of course he won. Or that’s what Calum told him a few minutes later once he made his way back to the bleachers.

Ashton didn’t like to think like that. He knew his streak was unusual and unlikely. The people around him didn’t expect anything less at this point. The pressure hadn’t gotten to him yet, but it was still really surprising. At least for him. He didn’t know if it was because all of the hours he’d spent practicing were paying off or if he was just lucky.

What was surprising was that Luke finished second. He apparently hadn’t missed by much, according to Calum.

When Ashton was greeted at the end of his lane by his coach, he looked over at Luke to find the other boy’s eyes already on him.

Luke gave him a smile, the beautiful one that Ashton liked so much, and a congratulatory thumbs up before Luke walked off toward his team.

Ashton felt lighter after that. Just because a boy smiled at him.

Ashton was still staring at him now, from across the room. Luke wasn’t looking at him, though. He was having a conversation with one of his teammates. Ashton was glad that his staring was going unnoticed - it was getting pretty out of hand if he was being honest with himself.

“Dude, you’re worse than I am,” Calum said, letting out a small giggle of laughter as he watched Ashton.

Ashton managed to tear his gaze away from Luke in order to look at Calum.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Ashton stated, appearing absolutely oblivious.

Calum squinted his eyes at Ashton, not falling for any of that. “I’ve been watching you since you first saw the guy. Are you really trying to convince me you haven’t been staring at him this whole time?”

Ashton wasn’t about to admit that he was, not even for a second.

“You mean Luke? I’m definitely not staring at him. Why would I be staring at him? I’m just, like, zoning out. There isn’t anything I’m looking at in particular,” Ashton explained.

Calum let out a loud laugh, shaking his head. “You’re such a shitty liar, Ash.”

Ashton didn’t respond.

“You know, it’s, like, okay if you are. You’re allowed to be attracted to someone. It might actually be good for you,” Calum said.

Ashton sighed, running a hand through his wet hair, tugging a little on the ends. He knew where this conversation was headed.

“It’s distracting. You know it is,” Ashton responded, letting his gaze drift back to Luke. This whole entire situation was the perfect example of how distracting it was.

“God, I don’t get you. It’s not like you’re getting married to the guy. You can just fuck him and move on, if that’s what you want. Judging by the way you’ve been looking at him, I’d say you probably wouldn’t mind that,” Calum stated, giving Ashton a pointed look.

“I don’t need to be fucking anyone. It’s not gonna happen,” Ashton said, his voice dropping lower so no one else would hear them.

Calum rolled his eyes. “The whole, “I’m-gonna-be-celibate-during-swim-season” thing is so stupid. It’ll help you relieve tension, you know…”

“I’m fine,” Ashton gritted out through his teeth. They went through this too often and it never failed to annoy Ashton beyond belief.

He never thought it was stupid, though. It was true that any sort of relationship or hook-up thing he could get involved in would distract him. The very little time during the year that it wasn’t swim season proved that to be true. He’d tried getting into a relationship over the summer last year and it completely backfired. He’d explained to the boy before things got complicated that whatever they had would have to end before he had to get back to swimming. He had assured Ashton that was fine.

Of course, when the time came it didn’t really go as Ashton had planned. He didn’t understand why Ashton would pick swimming over him and well, Ashton didn’t really have the time or energy to explain it to him.

He remembered how completely consuming the entire situation was and how _stupid_ he would have to be to want something like that during his busiest time of the year. It was one of the reasons why this entire thing between Calum and Michael was difficult for Ashton to get behind.

Calum was totally in love with Michael and it made him do things like get drunk the night before a meet. Why would Ashton want something like that?

“Okay, whatever you say,” Calum said, his voice completely sarcastic. “But I bet you’ll fuck him soon. I’m calling it right now.”

Instead of being annoyed anymore, Ashton just laughed with his best friend. It didn’t hurt to think about what it would be like to fuck Luke. He could do that all he wanted. Or that’s what Ashton was trying to convince himself.

***

Ashton was giving Harry a piggyback ride back to their mom’s car when he heard his name called out behind him.

He was looking forward to sleeping the rest of the afternoon after the long morning he’d had. He’d told his mom that he would meet her and Lauren in the car after he said goodbye to Calum and a few of his other teammates.

He was sure he’d said goodbye to everyone, so he was a little annoyed that he was being kept from some valuable nap time.

But he turned around to find Luke jogging toward him, a small smile on his face. Ashton couldn’t help but return one of his own in response.

He guessed he hadn’t actually said goodbye to everyone.

“Hi,” Luke said, his voice soft and quiet between them.

“Hi,” Ashton repeated, his smile widening in response. He was kidding himself if he wasn’t happy that Luke had found him again before he left.

“Hey, I’m Luke,” the taller boy said, looking at Ashton’s brother who was still draped over his back.

“I’m Harry,” the little boy replied, giving Luke a toothy smile.

Ashton squatted to the ground in order for Harry to jump down off of his back. “Hey, I gotta say goodbye to Luke. Go on and head to the car, okay? And tell Mom I’ll be there in a minute or two.”

Harry nodded, waving his goodbye to Luke before running off to the car. Ashton watched carefully until he saw his brother open the back seat and climb inside.

“So,” Ashton spoke, filling the ensuing silence. “Did you need something?”

“Yeah,” Luke nodded, shuffling on his feet as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. “Your number?”

The way he asked coupled with the look on his face almost made Ashton melt right there on the spot. He was beginning to wonder if Luke really knew what he was doing here. Despite what he’d convinced himself earlier, he was interested in Luke. He’d just have to make sure to keep things at a distance.

It was difficult, though, knowing that Luke was interested in him, too. He was also brave enough to ask for Ashton’s number, which he considered amazing. Ashton never really had the guts to do something like that, especially with someone he’d just met.

Ashton smiled in spite of himself as he reached out to take Luke’s phone. He hurriedly entered his name and number in the contact slots, handing the phone right back to the other boy. Ashton didn’t miss how Luke’s fingers grazed over his own as he took it back, making Ashton feel a little weak in the knees.

“I’m gonna text you. Hope that’s okay,” Luke said, taking his bottom lip in between his teeth. Ashton wanted to groan and bite Luke’s bottom lip himself.

“It’s definitely okay,” Ashton answered, shoving both of his hands in his pockets before he said his goodbyes. “I’ll talk to you later, then?”

“Yes, yeah. Later,” Luke stammered out, glancing down at his phone in what looked like disbelief. Ashton continued to smile as he walked backwards to his mom’s car, not taking his eyes off of Luke until he was inside.

***

Ashton fell fast asleep almost the second his head hit his pillow. He didn’t wake up until eight o’clock later that night. He knew he’d probably be up late tonight after sleeping all day, but he didn’t care. He’d needed sleep so damn bad.

Since it was dark now, he reached over to turn on his bedside lamp, sitting up on his bed. He grabbed his phone sitting on the bedside table, checking to see if he had any messages.

He had three.

Two were from Calum. One told him that Calum was about to beat Ashton’s high score in one of their favorite video games. The second told him that Calum had beaten it. The text contained a lot of exclamation points and swear words that made Ashton laugh. He sent back a quick _congrats_ with the unamused emoji. He didn’t know why Calum hadn’t slept the day away like he had, but Calum was weird so. There wasn’t really an explanation there.

The third one was from an unknown number.

_1 new message, sent at 4:28 pm: 555-7391  
hey it’s luke_

Ashton was sure his heart stopped beating. In his post-nap haze, he’d completely forgotten that he’d given Luke his number. And now he couldn’t believe that Luke hadn’t been kidding about texting him later. It all felt too surreal.

Ashton immediately replied back, saving Luke’s number in his phone after the message sent.

_hi_

Since it was several hours after Luke had originally texted him, Ashton hoped that Luke didn’t think he was ignoring him. Ashton also didn’t expect the other boy to text back right away either, so he set his phone down on his bed before getting up to get something to eat in the kitchen.

His mom had leftovers sitting out on the counter for him to reheat. He ate quickly and then had more after. His mom was no longer alarmed by the amount of food Ashton could eat at this point. She’d gotten used to it over the years because he swam so much. The more calories burned, the more food he needed in his system.

After dinner, he usually took a shower, but he didn’t have to tonight. He’d done that earlier today back at the natatorium in the locker room.

So instead, he’d said goodnight to his mom and siblings, telling them that he had some homework to do. In reality, he was probably going to read a book or watch a movie until he inevitably fell asleep again.

He didn’t expect three new texts. All from Luke.

_1 new message, sent at 8:11 pm: Luke  
hi_

_1 new message, sent at 8:12 pm: Luke  
how are you?_

_1 new message, sent at 8:39 pm: Luke  
i hope i’m not bothering you_

Ashton was pretty sure he looked absolutely ridiculous smiling down at his phone like he was. He wasn’t supposed to be happy about these texts, wasn’t supposed to feel so good about Luke wanting to talk to him. This was the exact opposite of what he needed to feel right now. What Ashton needed to do was not text back, to ignore Luke and just do his best to let these feelings go.

But he couldn’t help himself.

_i’m doing fine. i just ate dinner. was pretty much sleeping all day. how are you?  
you’re not bothering me at all btw_

Ashton didn’t expect an immediate response.

_i’m good. i just kinda woke up too_

This certainly didn’t keep Ashton from thinking what Luke looked like in bed. Naked. Crying out his name.

God, he really had to stop thinking like this.

Before he could text back, Luke had already sent him another one.

_you’re an amazing swimmer_

Ashton felt himself blushing again, which was stupid since he was just texting Luke. It’s not like Luke could see him or anything. And, like, Ashton got that compliment a lot. Why was this the first time he was blushing when someone said it to him?

_thank you. you’re really good too tho_

Ashton didn’t compete against Luke in his second event, but he’d watched the other boy in a few other races. He was in the same relay that Calum was in, actually. Luke’s team ended up winning.

_thanks. i really like watching you swim_

Ashton felt like he was going to turn into a puddle of goo.

_you’re beautiful_

Ashton hadn’t expected that last text. This was getting completely out of hand. He should really put a stop to it.

_hot and beautiful. that’s two compliments in one day, luke…  
you’re kind of killing me_

Ashton tacked on a winking emoji to the end of the second message. He was also pretty sure they were flirting now. Why was he not stopping this?

_if i got to know you better, i’d be able to give you other compliments too_

The next thing Ashton knew, it was one in the morning and the two of them hadn’t stopped texting even for a second. Ashton had even gone back to the kitchen to get some juice some time between eleven and midnight and he hadn’t set down his phone at all.

He’d found out so much about Luke in that time, too. 

He learned that Luke had moved around a lot as a kid, never really in a single place for more than a year or so. Finally, when he turned fourteen and told his parents how serious he was about swimming, they tried to stay in one place. And they did, until this year. He’d been extremely upset about it for weeks before they moved, but knew he had to get over it. Making the swim team and blowing everyone else away was what comforted him the most.

He also found out that Luke had two older brothers, both already moved out. He was the baby of the family, the complete opposite of Ashton. 

Ashton discovered that they had similar tastes in almost everything, too. They liked the same music, the same movies and TV shows. The only person he had this much in common with was Calum, and even then, it had taken years for him and Ashton to develop their friendship into what it was today. Whatever was happening between him and Luke was weird and instantaneous. He was completely failing at trying not to think about it too much.

Ashton felt himself yawning more often now, his eyes drifting closed in between feeling his phone vibrate in his hand, indicating a new message. The last thing he wanted was to fall asleep on Luke, so he should probably actually tell him that he needed to sleep soon.

_i’m sure your laugh isn’t annoying. i bet it’s really cute_

It was insane the amount of times Ashton had blushed tonight because of his boy. A boy he wasn’t even supposed to like.

_i promise it’s the most obnoxious thing you’ll ever hear. you should save yourself while you still can_

_i think making you laugh would be worth it_

Ashton didn’t know much about Luke’s past dating experiences, but Ashton had to admit that the other boy could flirt, even better than he could. And Ashton didn’t think he was so bad at it to begin with.

_i think i should probably go to bed soon. i can barely keep my eyes open_

Ashton knew this situation was getting too far and he wasn’t doing anything to stop it. But he didn’t _want_ Luke to stop texting him or stop flirting with him or for them to stop anything at all. He was torn between doing what he knew he should do and doing what he actually wanted to do. He would say it wasn’t fair that he was having to choose, but it was his own fault that that it had gotten to this point.

_same here but i don’t really want to stop talking to you. but i’ll let you go  
for now_

The winking emoji at the end of that last text was killing Ashton.

_i hope you sleep well and i guess i’ll be talking to you soon_

Ashton had absolutely no idea how to say goodbye right now, so he left it at that. He closed the messaging app on his phone, locking the screen and set it off on the bedside table. He knew Luke would probably say something else, but he really needed to sleep, like, right now.

In the morning when Ashton finally checked his phone again, he groaned loudly at what he saw.

_goodnight ash. i’ll try not to think about what you would feel like sleeping next to me_

***

“No, no. I’m not helping you get out of this mess. You’re the one with the stupid rule and then you go and flirt with him anyway. And this happened _after_ I warned you that you’d fuck it up!”

Calum’s voice was high and loud between them, and Ashton had to shush him to be quiet. They were in a public place, after all. The last thing he wanted was for other people to hear about all of this.

“I haven’t fucked anything up. Not yet. I’m trying to stop that from happening,” Ashton corrected, walking up toward his locker to get his books for the morning classes he had.

Calum leaned up against the one next to Ashton’s, giving him a dirty look.

“You just asked me if I could casually mention to Michael that you have a celibacy pact. It sounds like you’ve already gone too far to me,” Calum said.

“Fucking _stop_ calling it that,” Ashton grumbled, shoving books aside in his locker to take out his frustration.

After waking up yesterday and deciding that he would try to prevent this thing with Luke from going further, he was certain he’d be able to do that. But the second Ashton read that goodnight text, he’d lost it. He and Luke had basically spent the entire day and night flirting again. It didn’t help that Ashton genuinely liked Luke and, if there wasn’t insane amounts of chemistry between them, he knew they’d be amazing friends. But Ashton wanted way more than friendship and now he felt himself spiraling out of control.

“Why don’t you just explain to Luke what the deal is? Just tell him that you have this thing where you don’t fuck people during swim season and that the two of you can bang all you want once it’s over. I’m sure he’ll be more than happy to agree,” Calum continued, making it sound like it was the most obvious choice Ashton had.

Of course Ashton had thought of this, but there were several ways this could go wrong. What if Luke said that Ashton was leading him on by all of this flirting before he finally said something and then never spoke to him again? And Ashton would basically be asking Luke to wait on him when he shouldn’t have to, which could also result in Luke never speaking to him again. The last time Ashton had tried to explain this to someone, it ended horribly because they didn’t get it. He didn’t want that happening again.

Clearly, Ashton had thought about this too much. It was driving him crazy. It was why he’d shoved his phone in Calum’s face first thing this morning when he arrived at school and begged him for help.

He’d been so desperate that he’d even thought that Calum could casually tell Michael about Ashton’s thing, thinking that Michael would somehow mention it to Luke. But the more he thought about it, it was such a coward’s way out. Ashton didn’t want to be a coward.

“No, I can’t do that,” Ashton said, going on to explain all of the reasons why he couldn’t.

“Okay, fine. I just think telling the truth is the best option,” Calum said, and Ashton had a feeling he was right about that. But he couldn’t do it.

“Maybe you should just start acting like a dick to him. It’ll push him away and then you won’t have to worry about it,” Calum suggested, but then made a face immediately after he finished speaking. “No, wait. Don’t do that. Luke is too nice.”

Ashton nodded in response, feeling sick at the thought of pushing Luke away at all, but especially being rude to him. Ashton wasn’t capable of that.

“It sounds like he really likes you, Ashton. Like, _really_. I’ve never seen anyone be so sweet to you before,” Calum said, his voice softening as he looked at Ashton’s worried face.

“I know. He does, I think. The worst part is that I like him, too,” Ashton admitted, taking out the last book from his locker and shoving it into his backpack before closing it. He banged his head against his locker door once, letting it rest against the cool metal as he sighed.

“It’s not the worst part, okay?” Calum said, giving Ashton a shove with his shoulder. “Why can’t you just let it go? You like him, he likes you. Just stop thinking about it so much. Nothing’s happened yet. All you’ve done is flirt.”

“Yeah, but it’s _distracting_. He’s all I’ve thought about since I met him. _This_ isn’t helping,” Ashton whined, pulling back from his locker and gesturing to his phone that was still in Calum’s hand. He took it back after that, putting it in his pocket.

Calum sighed, running a hand through his curly hair.

“Looks like we’ve both got boy shit now. Welcome to the club,” Calum replied, giving Ashton a half-hearted smile as they both walked to class. 

The two of them talked about it a few more times that day in between their respective classes. The two classes Calum and Ashton had together were really busy, so they didn’t have time to talk at all during those.

Calum was still standing by his suggestion of Ashton chilling out and going with the flow. Although Calum understood that the flirting was only increasing, he still saw it as harmless.

“He hasn’t asked you out yet and you haven’t asked him out, so it seems pretty casual right now,” he’d said. “You’ve just met, I think you’ll be okay.”

Maybe Calum was right. If Ashton thought about it too much, it only distracted him more. And he had practice this afternoon from the second school ended until six o’clock. He didn’t have a single second to think about Luke.

The minute he got home, he started working on his homework, setting his phone to silent so he wouldn’t lose focus. He’d neglected most of it this weekend and he had to get at least some of it done tonight. He tried not to think about how Luke hadn’t texted him yet today.

He was probably busy. School and practice, too.

Or maybe he was waiting for Ashton to text him first today. Luke didn’t always have to be the one to text first.

 _God_ , he couldn’t even stop thinking about him for a second. Ashton felt so stupid. He felt like the clingy boyfriend but without an actual boyfriend or anything at all. He just had this strong attachment to Luke already and it was impossible to stop it.

He’d managed to finish a few of his assignments, his thoughts constantly going back to the Luke. It got to the point where Ashton couldn’t even take it anymore and he’d had to shove his homework into his backpack and go into the living room to watch some TV and hang out with his family. He’d made sure to bring his phone, though, just in case.

It was about halfway into the movie he and Harry were watching - some movie about dragons and training them or something, it was cute, but he was hardly paying attention - when his phone vibrated on his leg.

He’d made himself wait a moment before frantically unlocking his phone to read the text.

_1 new message, sent at 9:01 pm: Luke  
missed you today. school was so boring and practice sucked. can you make me feel better?_

Ashton bit his lip, trying to contain the smile that was threatening to take over his face. That stupid winking emoji was going to be the death of him.

_i can try. any ideas in mind?_

_yeah, but they kind of require your presence here_

Ashton swallowed loudly. His brother laughed next to him at the TV, snapping him out of the sudden Luke-induced haze. 

_oh really? care to share?_

_i wish you could come over here so i could just show you what i mean_

Ashton had to hold back a groan.

What he really needed to do was steer the conversation away from this topic right this second. This was really tricky territory.

_i wish i could come over there too_

Well, okay. He was a total idiot. It was like Ashton couldn’t physically stop himself at this point. He needed, almost craved, Luke’s attention. He was already crushing so hard on this boy, it was almost ridiculous.

_can you?_

Despite the fact that it was a school night, and he had to be up early in the morning for practice before school, he was actually considering it. But if he suddenly decided to get up and leave after he’d been at home for hours, his mom would be suspicious. And, like, it would be really weird to leave in the middle of this movie, too. She’d probably think something was wrong and he didn’t really want to explain that he was leaving to go over to a boy’s house that he barely knew and why. Of course, he’d never actually explain why.

_not tonight_

_tomorrow?_

Ashton was so torn. He’d be busy tomorrow, too. He didn’t have an afternoon practice, but he did have homework. 

_i’m gonna have a lot of homework but i want to say yes anyway_

He didn’t think it hurt being as truthful as possible here.

_what if i come over there? i can work on my homework too_

Ashton thought that was probably a terrible idea. Actually, it wasn’t _probably_ terrible. It was definitely terrible. Like he would ever be able to focus on his damn homework with Luke in the room. He could barely do it when Luke _wasn’t_ in the room.

He said yes anyway.

***

Ashton was a nervous wreck all day. Morning practice was probably the only part of his day where he was completely focused. That was mostly because he’d made himself promise not to look at his phone until after practice was over. He knew if he had looked at it right when he woke up like he wanted to, the only image he’d have in his head was Luke’s face.

He was really glad he’d made that promise.

_1 new message, sent at 5:53 am: Luke  
i can’t wait to see you. i’m going to be so impatient all day_

Ashton’s breath caught in his throat when he read it. Calum, who was standing next to him changing into his regular clothes, rolled his eyes.

Ashton had told Calum after that about his plans with Luke for later. Calum smirked and made some wise-ass comment about how he was right about everything and how fucked Ashton was, literally and figuratively.

Ashton punched him hard in the shoulder before stalking off to first period.

Now, he was sitting on his bed, his homework and notebooks surrounding him, waiting for Luke to arrive. His mom was working late today and had asked Ashton late last night after he made plans with Luke if he could pick up his siblings from their various after-school activities. Ashton had thought he’d have to cancel with Luke, but once he told his mom about his plans, she insisted that he study. She made arrangements for them to go home with friends until she could pick them up after work.

So, basically, Ashton had the house to himself for most of the afternoon into the evening. With Luke. Alone. For hours.

He really was fucked.

Luke texted him once he got there, having been dropped off by a friend. Ashton had agreed to take him home after they were finished here today. He didn’t mind at all because to him, it meant more time with Luke.

Ashton was at the front door just as Luke knocked, opening it wide for the boy to come inside.

Ashton froze.

Like, it wasn’t that he forgot that Luke was attractive. Honestly, he couldn’t get the image of the boy out of his head since they met. But it was one thing recalling memories of what he looked like to seeing it all in person. The way he dressed, how tall he was, the way his hair was styled perfectly, the way his eyes shone bright, how luminescent his skin was. It was overwhelming him all over again.

This was such a bad fucking idea.

Luke grinned at Ashton, his eyebrows raising up as he stood there. “Are you gonna invite me inside?”

Ashton snapped out of it, internally shaking himself out of it, before smiling back at Luke. “Yeah, sorry. Come on in.”

Luke stepped forward over the doorstep. Ashton didn’t miss how the other boy brushed his body against him when he could have easily walked through the wide space Ashton had given him.

Really, really bad idea.

If Ashton didn’t get his shit together right that second, he was going to tackle Luke in the middle of the entryway of his house and fuck him right there. That wasn’t an option.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and closed the front door. He turned around to face Luke after that, who was looking at everything he could get his eyes on in the house.

“Do you want me to show you around?” Ashton asked, picking with his fingers at the edge of his shirt, trying to distract his hands from reaching out to Luke instead.

Luke nodded, still giving him a wide smile.

Ashton took him through the various places in his house, not stopping anywhere for very long. It wasn’t particularly interesting, at least to him, so he didn’t want to bore Luke to death. But he showed him the living room, the kitchen, down the hallway where the bathroom was in case he needed it. 

Obviously the last place they stopped was Ashton’s room.

“Whoa, _dude_. Your room is so awesome,” Luke blurted out the second he walked inside. Ashton stood back behind the other boy after shutting the door, watching as Luke walked around. His gaze switched from the various band posters on the wall, the mountain of CDs and DVDs Ashton had stacked in the corner next to the TV, the desk on the opposite side of the room piled high with books and papers and his laptop.

The last place he looked was the bed, finding it covered in Ashton’s homework.

By this time, Ashton was standing next to Luke, waiting for Luke to finish before saying something.

“Thanks, uh, I like it. It’s cozy,” he said, wanting to smack himself really hard for not coming up with something better to say. Instead of allowing Luke any time to say something else, Ashton stepped forward toward his bed, relocating himself, surrounded by his homework. It was best to keep himself separated from Luke somehow. Homework was the excuse they both used today, so that was just what Ashton would do. If he didn’t have something, _anything_ to occupy his attention, the two of them would be doing a lot more than homework.

“You can sit wherever,” Ashton stated, gesturing around his room with his hand. “You can move whatever out of the way if you need to.”

Ashton expected Luke to sit at his desk, maybe move some books around to make room for his own. Maybe Ashton should have been more clear about his instructions, though, because that was definitely not what Luke did.

Luke smiled, stepping toward Ashton’s bed. He moved some papers around and a notebook, scooting it closer in Ashton’s direction. Then, he hopped up on it, crossing his legs and leaning back against the wall, his backpack on his lap. He took what he needed out of it before setting the bag on the ground.

Whatever look Ashton had on his face was apparently alarming because when Luke finally looked up at him, he looked worried.

“Oh, do you not want me on your bed? I can move somewhere else,” Luke quickly said, beginning to move himself forward with his books to find another spot.

“No! No, please. No, you can stay,” Ashton practically shouted, sitting up on his knees to place a hand on Luke’s chest, trying to push him back to his previous position.

Luke didn’t budge, though. He did, however, look down at where Ashton was touching him, taking a deep breath as he did so.

Ashton removed his hand immediately, his skin feeling like it had been burned in the process.

Luke looked up over at him again, locking their eyes together. Ashton was worried that the touching had done it, had made Luke feel completely weirded out and now he’d ask Ashton to take him home. Or maybe, not even that, he’d text his friend to turn back around, come and get him and take him away from the weird, touchy-feely boy.

Ashton almost wished that was what happened next.

It was like he blinked and suddenly Luke was launching himself across the various papers and homework Ashton had between them to attach his lips to Ashton’s. The homework was obviously forgotten as Ashton slipped his arms around Luke’s shoulders, bringing him closer and into a more comfortable position in order to do this.

This kiss was eager and quick. Now that they were finally doing this, finally kissing and touching one another, Ashton felt whole. He didn’t know how to explain it, but he was comfortable in Luke’s arms, more comfortable than he’d ever felt kissing another person before.

Luke’s lips were soft but strong, pressing hard against Ashton’s. It was the only place Luke was touching him. On the other hand, Ashton wanted to wrap himself up against the other boy, already sort of had at that point. He couldn’t get enough of this.

Finally, as if Luke had been waiting for a certain amount of time to pass once this began, he pushed himself closer, hard enough for Ashton to fall back against the bed with Luke hovering over him. Ashton thought he heard things being tossed to the ground, the noises vaguely sounding like falling notebooks and crumpled papers, but he was too distracted at the moment to care.

Luke pressed his body into Ashton’s then. The pressure of Luke’s chest against his own, their kisses increasing their pace by the second, all of it, was too much for Ashton.

“Wait,” he breathed out, pushing back against Luke, untangling his arms from around the boy’s neck. He’d let this get too far and he really couldn’t do it anymore. He liked what he had with Luke, but he knew it would only lead to future distractions and he almost felt like he was lying to the boy by not explaining everything. Lying by omission was still lying, he guessed.

“What’s wrong?” Luke asked, a worried expression falling over his face.

“I- I can’t do this. I’m sorry,” Ashton blurted out.

Before, Ashton was certain that Luke was the most beautiful person he had ever seen. His smile was infectious and perfect and lit up his entire face. But watching the boy’s face crumble after hearing his words made Ashton’s heart break. He never wanted to see that look on his face again, but there was nothing he could do since he was the cause of it.

“Why not?” Luke asked, his voice low and quiet, and sounding completely hurt. He pushed himself back into a sitting position and Ashton followed. Luke looked at him expectantly, his mouth turned down in the corners.

Ashton sighed deeply, already regretting this decision. He could have easily just let the two of them continue, they both would have been happy. But Ashton couldn’t risk it. He couldn’t risk getting distracted from swimming or letting what he and Luke could have had blow back in his face.

“It’s just, it’s really complicated. I know I’m going to come out sounding like a huge asshole if I explain it. If you-”

“Tell me,” Luke demanded, his eyes hardening as he looked at Ashton.

Ashton frowned, not expecting this other side of Luke to come out just yet. But he’d explain it, if that’s what Luke wanted.

“I have this thing. I don’t like getting distracted. Swimming is the most important thing in my life and I think that seeing someone is a pretty big distraction. It’ll take away the focus I need to put toward the team, if we do this.” Ashton had no idea what Luke’s reaction was going to be, but he knew that it would more than likely end up with the other boy never speaking to him again. 

Luke looked away from Ashton after that, watching his hands as they fingered against the fabric of his shirt. Ashton wanted him to say something, _anything_ , at this point. Even if it was just to yell at him, he thought it would be better than the silence.

“Okay,” Luke replied, after several long and excruciating moments. He glanced up at Ashton from underneath his eyelashes, a look that rendered Ashton momentarily speechless. Luke was so perfect, so pretty and beautiful, that it almost hurt. On top of that, Luke wasn’t angrily yelling at Ashton for leading him on or not wanting this. Ashton couldn’t believe he was pushing this boy away.

“Okay?” Ashton was completely confused. He needed an explanation and quick or else he would slowly drive himself crazy.

“I’m saying it’s okay. Did you think I would say something else?” Luke asked, raising an eyebrow up at Ashton. 

Ashton balked. But none of it was okay. Absolutely none of it. If the situation was reversed and Luke hadn’t mentioned a single thing about not being interested in seeing someone else until right now, Ashton would have been beyond pissed off. Luke had to be a saint or something. 

“I-yeah? I really did.” All Ashton could really do was stare back at Luke, whose expression was changing into a slightly amused one.

“Ash, I completely understand. I mean, yeah, I’m a little disappointed that I can’t kiss you or anything anymore because I really do like you. But I’m glad you told me,” Luke explained, shrugging one of his shoulders up and down. “Actually, I thought you were going to tell me that you were seeing someone else. That you had a girlfriend. Or boyfriend. Or whatever.” Luke rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, managing to give Ashton a small smile. Ashton just sat there in silence.

“If you had been seeing someone else, that would have really upset me. But you aren’t and I can’t really be mad at you for this reason, you know? You’re trying to work hard and you think that you’ll do better without any distractions. I can’t blame you for that.”

Luke had finished speaking and Ashton was so tempted to bang his head really hard against his bedroom wall. That’s how shitty he felt right now. Like, Luke actually understood him and was being sweet about it all and Ashton could almost cry because of it. Part of him was relieved that it didn’t seem like he’d be losing Luke, but in a way, he still kind of was. He didn’t know if he wished Luke would put up a bigger fight about it, because the whole point was to avoid drama. Ashton should be happy about this, but he really _really_ wasn’t.

“Why are you so sweet to me?” Ashton mumbled, looking down at his hands and not really directing the question to Luke.

“Because I like you. I just said that,” Luke answered, giggling a little bit, trying to ease the obvious leftover tension in the room.

Ashton scrubbed his hands over his face, the palms of his hands digging into his eyes. He heard Luke sigh and then felt two hands take Ashton’s wrists and bring them back down away from his face.

“Sorry,” Ashton said, shaking his head a little bit. He really had to stop feeling sorry for himself. He was the one who asked for this.

“It’s okay.” Luke squeezed both of Ashton’s wrists softly, letting his thumb graze over his pulse points. “Now, let’s do some homework?”

Both of the boys laughed quietly at that, bending down to grab all of the discarded books and papers from down on the ground.

***

Calum kind of stared at Ashton at his locker the next morning, no discernable expression on his face.

Ashton shifted from foot to foot, waiting for the other boy to say something. “Well?” he asked, impatient to hear Calum’s thoughts.

“Sorry, I, well, I guess I didn’t expect you to actually tell him the truth. You were really adamant about it yesterday,” Calum finally said.

Ashton had just finished giving Calum all of the details about what happened with Luke. He started from the second the boy arrived until Ashton had driven him back home a few hours after that. Ashton could almost still feel the burning sensation leftover on his cheek after Luke had kissed him sweetly goodbye.

“I had to. He was kissing me and it was, like, _so_ good and I just couldn’t do it,” Ashton explained. “It felt like lying to him.”

Calum nodded in agreement, but didn’t say much else. He looked to be contemplating exactly what he wanted to say. Ashton had asked him what he thought about the whole thing, if maybe Calum thought Luke wasn’t actually upset or if he was doing a good job of hiding it.

“He doesn’t seem like the type to lie to you. Or at all, really,” Calum commented, taking a few books out of his locker as he did so. “I think it’s okay, Ash. Has he texted you?”

Ashton nodded.

Luke had asked Ashton to text him once the boy got back to his house after dropping Luke off. From there, it took off like it had every other night since they met. They didn’t stop talking to one another until they both went to sleep. The only thing that had been missing from the conversation was the usual flirtatious undertones scattered throughout their messages.

Ashton didn’t want to miss it, but he did.

“Then I think everything’s fine. This is what you wanted, right?”

“Yep,” Ashton replied, giving Calum his usual smile. Calum didn’t smile back. Instead, he just raised his eyebrow.

“You’re still a shitty liar.” But Calum slammed his locker door shut, grabbing onto Ashton’s arm and tugging him off to class before he could say anything back.

Later that day, when both Calum and Ashton were having lunch, Ashton asked about Michael.

The smile on Calum’s face was instant, almost as if he’d been waiting for Ashton to ask this question for ages. It almost made Ashton feel bad for focusing on his own issues so much for the past few days.

“He’s good. We’ve been texting a lot,” Calum answered, shoveling a few more bites of his mashed potatoes into his mouth before getting out his phone. He opened up the messaging app and pulled up his and Michael’s conversation, sliding it over to Ashton.

Ashton read through some of it, but was mostly too grossed out to really read more than a few of them. “Okay, who knew the two of you could be so cheesy?”

Calum beamed at that, taking back the phone once Ashton was done. “He’s never really been like that before. It kind of just started happening recently.”

Ashton managed to give Calum a small smile back. Obviously, it was a surprise for the both of them. Calum wasn’t kidding when he said Michael had never acted like that before. Michael was usually laid back and super aloof about any sort of feelings people had about him. Or, at least he was good at pretending.

Ashton desperately hoped that Michael wasn’t playing Calum with all of this. He knew this made his best friend happy, but if it ended up being a huge joke to Michael, Ashton wouldn’t hesitate to drive all the way to the other side of the city, waltz into Michael’s school and scour the halls for him until he found the stupid prick and punched the shit out of him.

“I’m really glad, Cal. You guys are going out Friday?” he asked, referring to one of the last texts he’d seen the two of them exchange.

“Yeah, like, just the two of us,” Calum said, his smile widening.

Ashton found himself smiling back at Calum, genuinely happy for his best friend. He wanted to be wary about Michael, but he felt like he’d given Calum a hard enough time about it to last a lifetime. And it seemed, at least for now, that things were going pretty decently. Ashton didn’t want to sound cynical and disbelieving. What he wanted was to be supportive.

The warning bell rang a moment later, signaling the end of lunch. The school day sped by after that, and transitioned straight into Ashton’s afternoon swimming practice.

Despite how he was supposed to be completely distraction-free, his mind occasionally wandered to the thought of Luke. He hardly even realized he was doing it until it was too late and he was already neck deep in daydreams of the blonde boy. It was hard to pull himself out of them.

It was no wonder that almost the second Ashton finished his homework later that evening, he texted Luke.

_hey_

As he waited for a reply, Ashton laid back on his bed, turning on his TV and mindlessly watched reruns of _Friends_. He tried not to look at his phone every ten seconds, but it was extremely difficult.

About an hour passed without a reply from Luke. And, because Ashton was attempting to convince himself that he was fine with this, he left his phone in his room once his mom announced that dinner was ready.

He returned a little while later, immediately smiling down at his phone once he saw there were two new text messages.

_1 new message, sent at 7:30 pm: Luke  
hi_

_1 new message, sent at 7:49 pm: Luke  
how are you?_

Ashton shouldn’t have been as excited as he was about this. He didn’t get excited when he texted his other friends, or Calum. Obviously, he knew why that was the case. He just didn’t want to admit it to himself.

_i’m fine i just had dinner  
how are you?_

_i’m good_

Ashton didn’t really know what he expected - maybe a little more detail about Luke’s day, especially because the boy didn’t ever spare much information about stuff like that.

_how was your practice?_

_it was fine_

Ashton frowned then. He felt his stomach start to knot up a little bit. His brain was starting to overthink everything, which wasn’t really like him. Was Luke mad at him? If so, was it because of what happened yesterday? Was there another reason? Was he just tired?

Ashton wished he could ask, but he didn’t know if he had the guts to. Or if it was his business. But Ashton thought that he and Luke had clicked so much, even on a friendship level, that they’d still be able to talk like they normally did.

 _Fuck it_ , Ashton thought. He was going to ask anyway. It was no use pretending that he didn’t still care about Luke.

_is everything okay?_

His heart sped up in his chest and quickened even more once he saw the little typing bubble pop up after he’d sent the text. He didn’t know if he was ready for Luke’s reply.

_not really  
i’m sorry i’m being weird. i just don’t know how to act around you_

After last night, Ashton assumed that they’d be okay. At least in his head, they were completely themselves minus the flirting. 

_can you tell me why? i’d like the chance to fix it, if i can_

More than anything else, Ashton didn’t want to lose Luke, even if he had to settle for being just friends. His biggest nightmare was completely losing the boy so he’d try to do anything he could to stop that from happening.

_maybe i wish you had told me about all of that stuff before we kissed_

This just made Ashton more confused. He didn’t even know what that meant. He truthfully hadn’t meant to let it get that far. The kiss had surprised him, but he’d gone along with it. He agreed that maybe he shouldn’t have let that happen, but he had apologized for it. Now, he was just kind of clueless.

_why?_

He wasn’t sure that was the best question to ask, but if he was going to be able to fix this, he needed to understand what Luke was trying to say.

_i can’t get you out of my head, ash_

Oh.

Ashton didn’t even know what to say. If only Luke knew how he felt. That he’d been suffering from the same exact thing. After the way Luke acted yesterday, like everything was absolutely fine, Ashton thought that Luke hadn’t formed as much of an attachment as he previously thought. Unlike Ashton, Luke had seemed to immediately adjust to the sudden change in their relationship, brushing it off and assuring him that he was fine with everything.

_i’m really sorry. i want to make everything okay. i don’t want you to hate me but i understand if you do_

_you’re so stupid_  
 _i could never hate you_  
 _that’s the problem_

Ashton squeezed his eyes shut, feeling his stomach clench after that message. Even after all of this bullshit Ashton was putting Luke through, the other boy still liked him. 

_all i keep thinking about is how amazing you are and what it felt like to kiss you, what you tasted like_

Luke hadn’t even given Ashton a chance to reply before sending that second text. He felt his stomach clench again, except this time it was mixed with something else other than guilt. He remembered what it was like to kiss Luke, how he wished the other boy was here so he could do it again. He knew it was wrong to want that, but he couldn’t help it.

_luke…_

_i know, i’m sorry. i shouldn’t even be talking about this_

_no it’s okay. it’s hard for me too, you know?_

_really?_

Ashton sighed. This was beginning to border on a bad topic of conversation. If he admitted to feeling the same way Luke did, he didn’t see how this would help either of them. But he wanted to make the other boy feel better, to let him know that he wasn’t the only one feeling like that.

_yeah. let’s just say i’m having the same problem_

Ashton waited several long minutes before he finally got an answer back from Luke. He was close to biting off all of his fingernails at this rate.

_i’m trying to be good i promise, ashton. but if you want me too then what are we doing?_

Ashton groaned into his pillow, wanting to scream. He laid there for a few moments, trying to think of what to say. Finally, he replied, not really knowing what else to do here.

_i don’t know but i just want you to know that even though we aren’t together, that doesn’t mean i don’t want to be  
i want you so bad, okay?_

_okay_

Ashton was about to rip his hair out, but then he saw the typing bubble again.

_i’m pushing you, i know, i won’t do it anymore_

_it’s okay, luke. i should have told you all of this before we got too involved_

_can we talk about something else?_

Ashton sighed, both sad and relieved. He really did want to talk about something else because he was honestly two seconds away from caving and telling Luke that he didn’t care about his stupid no-relationships thing. 

_yeah we definitely can_

The two boys swiftly and casually changed topics. It was several hours later when Luke brought up the two of them spending time together again.

_maybe on friday. like just as friends?_

Ashton really wanted that, so he didn’t hesitate.

_yes i really want to see you_

_wanna go to the movies?_

_sounds good_

They talked about their plans a little longer before Luke announced that he was really tired. Ashton said his goodbyes, his mind immediately going back to their earlier conversation. It appeared that Luke hadn’t so seamlessly transitioned into just friends like Ashton had thought he had. He felt like the conversation hadn’t really ended either, but rather been avoided. Ashton didn’t want to talk about it, though. He was too afraid that he’d give in.

He was happy to avoid it for as long as possible. Just thinking about what he could have with Luke made his stomach hollow out, like he was missing this huge part of him. 

Ashton fell asleep with thoughts of kissing Luke running through his head. It was no wonder he dreamed about it, too.

***

Ashton and Luke agreed to meet outside the movie theater about fifteen minutes before it started. Ashton got there earlier.

He was a little nervous and he didn’t know why. They were just two friends hanging out. It was no different from spending time with Calum. Okay, he didn’t want to kiss Calum or hold his hand, so it was a little different. And he knew that Calum didn’t like him, not like that.

He _did_ know Luke liked him, though. And Luke wanted to do those things with Ashton, too. And Luke knew Ashton wanted those things.

So, it was basically a huge mess and yeah, Ashton was super nervous about it. 

He headed inside once he got there, buying the two of them the tickets to see some post-apocalyptic movie that Luke really wanted to see. Ashton didn’t care what they saw - he just wanted to see the other boy and make him happy.

After he bought the tickets, he almost went to buy them both food at the concession stands, but he didn’t know what Luke liked and he thought that might be a little bit weird. He already bought them both tickets, which he knew would surprise Luke. If he bought them food, it would seem like a date and Ashton knew it.

So, he waited by the door, tickets in hand, for Luke to get there. His heart totally wasn’t about to beat out of his chest.

Ashton almost missed the boy walk by him a few minutes later. He wasn’t dressed how he normally was, which was probably why. Luke was wearing a sweater, one that fell over his hands, creating sweater-paws and making him look a million times sweeter than normal. His usual skinny jeans were on, too, but he wore a beanie and his usual quiffed hair wasn’t styled today. He looked beautiful still, but more cuddly and comfortable. Ashton wanted to kiss him.

“Hey,” Ashton called out, Luke turning around in search of Ashton’s voice. He grinned once he noticed Ashton, immediately walking up to him. Ashton couldn’t help it - he needed to feel Luke - so he opened his arms up, wrapping his arms around Luke’s waist in a hug. Luke seemed surprised for a moment but responded by wrapping his own arms around Ashton’s shoulders. Ashton may have momentarily buried his face in the crook of Luke’s neck, but pulled back before Luke could say anything.

“Hey,” Luke murmured back, letting his arms stay draped over Ashton for a heartbeat longer than necessary.

“I, um, got your ticket,” Ashton mumbled, holding it out for Luke, whose eyes widened with his smile as he took it from Ashton. Ashton felt the boys fingers skim over his own, which he wasn’t sure was intentional or not.

“Thanks, Ash,” Luke replied softly, taking his bottom lip between his teeth. He seemed a little nervous, too, which oddly comforted Ashton. At least he wasn’t the only one here who was feeling a little anxious about this.

“So, um, popcorn?” Luke asked, his thumb pointing in the direction behind him where the concession area was.

Ashton nodded vigorously. “Yes. Candy, too. I have such a sweet tooth.”

Luke laughed softly, the both of them walking toward the line. “That’s because you _are_ sweet.”

Ashton blushed furiously, shaking his head and looking down at the ground.

“Sorry. Was that too cheesy?” Luke asked, looking over at Ashton while he looked back up at Luke.

“No. I’m just not used to that kind of attention,” Ashton admitted, shrugging one of his shoulders as if it was obvious.

“Why do I somehow doubt that?” Luke questioned, his expression incredulous.

“I don’t know? I mean, yeah, I get compliments. They’re mostly directed toward my swimming capabilities. I know how to handle stuff like that,” Ashton explained, shoving both of his hands in his pockets as he stepped forward, the line moving up.

Luke appeared to think about this for a second before finally speaking up again. “But not flirting?”

Ashton would be lying if he said that people didn’t flirt with him. He wasn’t completely dense. And he appreciated it, of course. But, with the rule that he had for himself, there wasn’t a lot he could do with it. He never really flirted back, not unless he’d maybe had one too many drinks at a party.

It wasn’t like he intentionally closed himself off from socializing with others. Except that, okay, maybe he did a little bit.

As he thought about it, he realized that the idea of flirting with anyone that wasn’t Luke was not appealing to him. Even if he allowed himself to see other people, there wasn’t anyone else he wanted to do it with.

It made his stomach hollow out again.

“I guess it happens sometimes. Not as often as what Calum deals with, believe me,” Ashton said, trying to throw the attention elsewhere, away from him. And technically, he wasn’t lying. While Ashton still had compliments thrown his way and people attempting to flirt with him sometimes, Calum had at least twice as many admirers. 

Luke giggled a little bit, still looking at Ashton. “I guess I’ll have to make up for that, then.”

Ashton felt his cheeks redden even more. He wanted to tell Luke that was definitely not helping, that it was against his rules. But for some reason, he couldn’t speak up to protest against it.

When the two of them approached the counter, Ashton gestured for Luke to go first. His face contorted into a shocked expression once Luke had finished ordering a multitude of different things ranging from popcorn to soda to candy. He even ordered some nachos. At first, Ashton thought maybe Luke was ordering for the both of him, but once he rattled off what he wanted, he looked at Ashton expectantly, waiting for him to go.

Ashton quirked his eyebrow, fighting off an amused smirk before asking for a few things, too.

He reached for his wallet again when Luke touched his arm, stopping him from any further movement. “I’ve got it.”

Ashton frowned. “No, Luke. That’s too much.”

“You got the tickets. I’ll pay for this, it’s no big deal,” Luke said, already taking out his cash and handing it over before Ashton could do anything to stop him.

Ashton pouted.

“What? It’s seriously nothing,” Luke exclaimed, taking the tray of food in one of his hands, his drink in another. Ashton took a few of the items and stuffed them in his pockets since some looked like they’d precariously tip over. Luke gave him a thankful look before the two of them walked toward the theater.

When they got inside, it seemed that not a lot of people were there since there were several areas of open seats to choose from.

“How about at the very top?” Luke asked, looking at Ashton for confirmation. Ashton nodded, completely fine with that. 

Once the two of them made it up there and settled into their seats, the previews started almost immediately, leaving no real time for the two of them to talk.

But it kind of didn’t matter, at least not to Ashton. The mere presence of Luke was enough to simultaneously calm him down and make him anxious. Like, it felt so good to have Luke there next to him, almost to where he could feel the warmth of the boy radiating off of him. But at the same time, sitting next to the boy he really liked in a dark movie theater for almost two hours was excruciating. Knowing that he could easily reach over and hold Luke’s hand, or more, without the other boy objecting, was enough to keep him on edge.

A moment later, he felt Luke’s elbow nudge into his arm. At first Ashton thought maybe it was an accident, so he didn’t react, but he felt it again a few seconds afterward. He looked over at Luke who was holding out a box of some sort of chocolate candy, silently asking Ashton if he wanted any.

Ashton held his hand out as Luke poured the candy into his hand, watching as Ashton ate the food. Whatever it was, it was delicious and Ashton’s eyes widened as he continued chewing. Luke grinned happily back at him, turning back toward the screen a second later with that stupid, silly smile on his face.

How Ashton was expected to pay any attention to this movie with Luke Hemmings sitting next to him?

He distracted himself by eating on the food he had, hardly watching the movie at all. The bits he did watch weren’t all that interesting and were pretty much like any other post-apocalyptic action film he’d seen before.

About halfway through the movie, once he finally stopped eating and actually focused on the movie, he felt a tug on his sweater.

Ashton turned to face Luke, surprised that his face was a lot closer to his than it was before. Ashton let out a sharp breath but didn’t move his head back.

“Yeah?” he whispered, mesmerized by Luke’s eyes that were staring back at him with an expression that Ashton didn’t recognize.

“Can I move this?” Luke asked, gesturing down to the armrest in between them, the one that could be shifted back in order to create space in between seats.

Ashton swallowed loudly, not really knowing why Luke was asking. All he could do was nod in response. Luke gave him a small smile, lifting it up almost as soon as Ashton gave an affirmative.

The next thing Ashton knew, Luke was settling in closer to him, bringing his knees up and curling his legs under him while he rested his head against Ashton’s shoulder. Luke’s entire side was up against Ashton’s arm, which caused him to tense. What was Luke doing?

“Luke?” Ashton whispered again, squirming a little under the pressure. 

Luke lifted his head up and looked at Ashton. “Oh, do you not want to do this? I can move back, it’s fine.”

He even started shifting back toward his own seat when Ashton reached out to stop him, wrapping his arm around Luke’s shoulder to bring him back down against him, back to where he was before. He felt Luke hum contentedly, his nose running along the exposed skin of Ashton’s neck for a moment before settling back to watch the movie.

Ashton had no idea what this was or why he was allowing it. He should have insisted they have their space. But, he was beginning to reason with himself. It’s not like he and Calum haven’t cuddled while watching a movie or TV together. This was okay.

Of course, this made it infinitely more difficult to concentrate on the movie. All Ashton could think about was how warm he was now, how slow Luke’s breathing was, how completely right it felt to have his arm around the boy. He had to bite back a groan of frustration.

After what seemed like an eternity later - but was probably only fifteen minutes - Luke moved his head back to look at Ashton, a small pout on his face.

“What?” Ashton asked, worried that something was wrong.

“My hands are really cold, Ash,” Luke sighed, and Ashton looked to see the boy’s hands balled up in his sweater sleeves. Ashton didn’t know what to do about this, though, so he looked up at Luke a little hopelessly.

“Can I?” Luke whispered, moving his sweater back off of his hands in order to tug at the bottom of Ashton’s sweater, a gesture that Ashton wasn’t expecting. He still wasn’t exactly sure what Luke was asking, which apparently showed on his face because Luke huffed a little bit. Instead of verbally explaining what he wanted, Luke lifted up Ashton’s sweater and let both of his hands rest against his warm stomach. Ashton jumped a little bit at the shock from the cold, but now he finally understood what Luke was talking about.

Luke looked at him with a raised eyebrow, asking if it was okay still.

“O-okay,” Ashton mumbled back, squirming around a little at the discomfort that Luke’s freezing cold hands were giving him. But he stilled once Luke settled back, his head finding Ashton’s shoulder again, his hands warming up on Ashton’s stomach.

By now, Ashton wasn’t clueless as to what Luke was doing. He may have let all of this slide if Luke wasn’t slowly letting his fingers trace against Ashton’s stomach in small patterns. Of course, Luke hadn’t been lying - his hands really were cold. But there was no need for him to touch Ashton like this, causing goosebumps to break out all over his skin. Luke knew exactly what he was doing.

He was _such_ a tease. And truthfully, Ashton should be beyond frustrated with these attempts at pushing him toward something he’d already said they couldn’t have. However, the only frustration he was feeling right now was of the sexual kind.

But Luke was smart, he knew Ashton was slowly reaching a breaking point. The burning and tightening sensation in his gut right now was a clear sign that this was beginning to affect him, emotionally and physically. How could it not? The sweetest, most beautiful boy he’d ever seen had his hands up his shirt, rubbing patterns onto his stomach with his face only inches away. It was impossible not to want things to continue.

“Luke…” Ashton let out a low whine, his tone filled with warning.

Despite how much he was enjoying it, this had to stop. Ashton was about two seconds away from getting hard, and that would lead to even more complications. 

Luke turned to face him, his eyes wide with innocence, his eyebrows raised. That look shouldn’t have made things worse for him, but it did. He just looked so _pretty_ and Ashton wanted to take Luke’s bottom lip in between his teeth or maybe make Luke leave kisses all over his belly. It was nearly impossible for him to think about anything else right now.

“Yes, Ashton?” Luke even had the nerve to bite his bottom lip and really, why was Ashton even denying himself in indulging in what they both wanted at this point?

How bad would it be if he leaned forward and captured Luke’s lips with his own? If he pushed Luke’s hand further down, over the hardening bulge in his pants, showing him exactly what he was feeling right now?

Then, one of Luke’s hands shifted again, his fingers digging harder into Ashton’s stomach, causing him to gasp a little.

It would be very, very bad.

Ashton reached up to hold onto Luke’s wrist, halting him from moving his hand anymore. He gave the boy a pointed look, letting him know that he knew what Luke was up to.

Luke didn’t even try to look guilty. He still had that completely _what did I do?_ look on his face and it made Ashton want to scream.

“Stay still, please,” Ashton murmured, his voice surprisingly quiet and calm, completely unlike how he actually felt on the inside. His eyes pleaded with Luke to behave, but he didn’t know if he would, though.

“Okay,” Luke replied, no discernable look on his face. He didn’t move until Ashton removed his grip on the boy’s wrist. He shifted back down, right back into his previous position, his hands no longer moving. They rested completely still against Ashton’s stomach, which gave Ashton enough time to calm his body down again.

He couldn’t believe how close he was to giving in. Again. Was this going to happen every single time he was with Luke? Would he have to start avoiding the boy in order to stop that from happening?

The worst part was that even the thought of leaving Luke alone made him feel sick. So, obviously that wasn’t an option for him.

The rest of the movie passed by without incident. Luke didn’t try anything else, didn’t squirm around or move his hands anymore. Ashton was extremely thankful.

But, once the credits began, Luke made no move to get up. He stayed exactly in the same spot he’d been in since he curled up next to Ashton. For a second or two, Ashton thought that Luke had fallen asleep or something. But as people started filing out of the theater, Luke finally moved his head back off of Ashton’s shoulder.

Honestly, his head wasn’t that far away from Ashton’s. Ashton could feel Luke’s small breaths against his face, the boy’s gaze moving all over his face.

Ashton cocked his head to the side, giving Luke a slightly concerned expression.

“Are you mad at me?” Luke asked, sounding quiet and a little worried.

A crease formed between Ashton’s eyebrows. “No? Why would I be mad?”

Luke’s mouth twisted. “You know why…”

Ashton’s face smoothed out after that, moving one of his hands up to Luke’s face. He let his thumb graze softly against the boy’s cheekbone, trying to be as gentle as possible.

“I’m not, I promise. You just kill me a little bit,” Ashton said, sighing softly after he finished speaking.

Luke managed to give Ashton a small smile. “It’s my fault. I swear I didn’t mean to push your buttons.”

Ashton would beg to differ, but he didn’t want to argue with Luke.

He sighed again, dropping his hand from Luke’s face. He shifted forward while Luke removed his hands from underneath Ashton’s shirt. He didn’t say anything as he stood up, holding his hand out to help Luke stand up. 

“Do you want me to drive you home?” Ashton asked, Luke taking his hand and standing up, stretching his arms over his head as he did so. Ashton attempted not to stare at the boy’s exposed belly as his sweater rode up, but completely failed. His face heated up as he watched Luke catch him, smirking a bit while Ashton quickly looked away.

“Yeah, thanks,” Luke replied, grabbing Ashton’s hand again as they finally made their way out of the empty theater, back to the parking lot.

“I think we should talk about stuff,” Ashton said, glancing up at Luke from underneath his eyelashes, hoping that the boy wouldn’t be too opposed.

Luke looked back at him, a worried look taking over his features.

Ashton squeezed his hand as they walked. “It’s okay. It’s just, like, about this kind of thing.” Ashton lifted up their linked hands, meaning their displays of affection.

He didn’t want to be the person to bring it up, but he knew the two of them clearly needed to. Lines were being blurred and they hadn’t really had much of a conversation after Ashton had put a stop to all of this. They’d never had that “just friends” discussion. The things they had actually talked about only made things more confusing. All they knew was that they liked each other but they couldn’t do this. And because it was Ashton who was keeping the two of them from being anything, he felt like he had to be the one to initiate this topic. Luke still looked worried and Ashton wished he could ease the boy’s mind, but he really didn’t know how.

He didn’t let go of Luke’s hand the entire walk to his car, even when he had to fish his keys from his back pocket and awkwardly unlock the door with one hand.

Once Luke got inside, he turned for face him, giving him a small but apprehensive smile.

“The reason I even think we need to talk about this is because I’m having a such a hard time. I’m trying so hard not to want you, but nothing is working,” Ashton admitted, running one of his hands through his hair, tugging on the ends a bit.

Luke stayed quiet, biting on his bottom lip and staring at Ashton.

“I didn’t think holding your hand or cuddling with you would make me want you more, but it does,” Ashton mumbled, looking away from Luke and down at his lap instead. “And before you say it’s your fault, it’s not. It’s totally mine.”

Luke still wasn’t saying anything, which was actually starting to worry Ashton. And sometimes, out of nervousness, Ashton rambled on and on. It was a terrible trait.

“I want to be your friend. But I want to be more, too. I shouldn’t even be saying these things, it probably only makes it worse for you, and I already know I’m making everything complicated. I don’t think it’s fair to ask you to wait because-”

“I’ll wait,” Luke interrupted, causing Ashton to whip his head up quickly to look at him. 

“Luke, I can’t-”

“Ashton,” he said, his voice serious and unwavering. “I’ll wait for you. That’s what I want.”

Ashton felt like he couldn’t breathe all of a sudden. It was so much for him to even think about. He didn’t know _why_ Luke was going to wait - he’d done nothing but confuse the poor boy - but as much as he was confused, he was also incredibly happy.

“Did you think I was going to say something else? I’ve been waiting for you to ask for days now,” Luke explained, giving Ashton a sweet smile.

Ashton shook his head, still kind of in shock.

“I told you I like you. I’m pretty much willing to do whatever in order to be with you,” Luke continued, his features softening even more as he reached out for Ashton’s hand.

“I guess I was expecting the worst. In the past, this hasn’t been easy and I told myself that getting involved with someone else would be a bad idea,” Ashton stated, not really wanting to get into too much detail about his past. “I didn’t think it would suck so much.”

Luke squeezed Ashton’s hand in his, just like he had done earlier to the other boy.

“I’ll be here. Whenever you’re ready. I’ll try not to push you anymore,” Luke said, and Ashton was about to open his mouth to protest when Luke lifted his finger up to Ashton’s mouth, stopping him from talking. “You know I was, you can stop pretending.”

Ashton let out a soft laugh, Luke moving his finger away from the other boy’s lips. “That makes it sound like I wasn’t enjoying it. I definitely was. That’s why I asked you to stop.”

“That’s good to know.” The smirk on Luke’s face grew, making Ashton blush a little bit. “God, Ashton. You can’t blush like that. It just makes me want to kiss you.”

This only made his face become more red. “I can’t help it!” he blurted out.

Luke leaned forward, his forehead resting against Ashton’s. He let out a long sigh, his eyes closing.

“We shouldn’t even be doing this,” Ashton whispered. “Every time I’m around you, it gets worse. You’re not supposed to be this much of a distraction.”

He watched as Luke smiled softly, his eyes still shut. “I would say I’m sorry, but I’m kind of not.”

Ashton swore he saw Luke shift forward slightly, his lips parting in invitation. He’d never really know for sure because a horn blared loudly in the parking lot, startling both of the boys and causing them to jump back away from each other.

Ashton decided to take Luke home then, not wanting to risk anymore potential slip-ups. Luke never stopped holding his hand until Ashton walked him to his front door. Maybe the boy left another kiss on his cheek before saying goodnight, closing the door only when Ashton’s car was out of sight.

***

Oddly enough, time seemed to speed by faster than it ever had before. Maybe it was a combination of senior year, and all that came with it, as well as a hectic swim season.

It had been a few weeks since the season had started back up again, meaning that Ashton was fully immersed back into the routine. He was comforted by it, though. He was used to it.

What he wasn’t used to, and probably never would be, was Luke Hemmings.

Ashton didn’t know how much his resolve could be tested in such a short amount of time. If he thought he was almost breaking the first few times they hung out together, he quickly learned that he was in for it.

Luke was truly amazing. Even though the two of them clearly had intense feelings for one another, they had developed their friendship into something so strong over the last few weeks. They were constantly texting back and forth. Actually, a few days ago, they’d progressed to actually talking on the phone, which Ashton definitely preferred. It definitely didn’t have anything to do with Luke’s sweet but sexy voice. No, not at all.

They couldn’t always hang out together, which Ashton tried not to pout about too often. Of course, he was able to do everything he normally did when he wasn’t with Luke, like hang out with Calum or his family.

Although, Calum had definitely been busier than usual lately. There was only one guess as to what that meant. Ashton didn’t mind that so much either. 

He’d actually gotten a chance to spend some time with Luke last night. The boy had come over to Ashton’s again, the two of them having dinner with his family and playing video games in his room, watching TV and eventually falling asleep. They’d only been woken up by Luke’s phone ringing, his mom calling and wondering why he wasn’t home yet.

And like every Saturday for the past month, Ashton looked forward to seeing the boy, even though he knew that he wouldn’t really get a chance to talk to him until afterward. For him, it was still enough for him to be in the same room.

Of course, it was more than obvious that Ashton’s feelings for Luke had only developed further. He thought maybe Luke could tell, too, even if Ashton had never directly said anything. Their displays of affection had only increased, despite Ashton’s initial strong feelings against them. But honestly, it was his fault. Luke had stopped his teasing for the most part, he really was being good. Ashton was the one who had started initiating more. He couldn’t even remember actively making the decision to, it just sort of happened. He’d been sitting next to Luke one night and the next thing he knew, they were cuddled up next to one another, their legs intertwined and their arms around each other.

The urge to kiss him, and more, was getting harder and harder to fight off. Ashton was constantly having to fight off getting turned on around Luke basically every time they were around each other. He wished he wasn’t that guy, but he definitely was. Luke was more than just cute, at least to Ashton.

On the ride home last night, Luke had briefly mentioned his parents would be out of the house the next night and that Ashton was more than welcome to come over if he wanted. Ashton had thought it sounded nice, but he couldn’t risk being alone with Luke again, at least not that soon. The problem was that he wanted more than anything to spend time with the boy. He’d told Luke that he’d let him know today after the meet what his final decision was.

This morning, when he’d arrived to the natatorium, he made his way over to Calum, plopping down on the bleacher next to the boy. That was when he had a brilliant idea.

“Hey, do you wanna hang out with me and Luke tonight?” Ashton asked, not realizing his voice had raised until he saw Calum wince.

“Dude, please use your inside voice,” Calum pleaded, rubbing his eyes for a second before looking over at Ashton. “I’m a little hungover.”

“Again? Are you kidding?” Ashton hardly felt bad for Calum at all this time. Honestly, he should know better and he really didn’t feel like giving a lecture this early in the morning.

Calum rolled his eyes. “Yeah. Mikey and I had a little too much fun. I could go into detail, but I don’t think you want to know about that.”

Ashton grimaced, not saying anything because Calum was absolutely right. He didn’t want to hear anything about what Michael and Calum got up to together. 

“If you suck today, that’s your own fault,” Ashton stated, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Well, you know, not all of us would prefer swimming to actual human companionship, Ashton,” Calum spat out, but immediately froze after he realized what he’d said.

Ashton looked away from the other boy, sighing heavily.

“I’m sorry. I- you know I didn’t mean it like it sounded,” Calum mumbled, but Ashton still didn’t look at him, choosing to stare out at the pool instead.

It wasn’t like he didn’t know what Calum was saying already. It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did. However, after all of this bullshit with Luke going on for so long, those words hit a lot closer to home.

“I’m gonna be honest with you, okay? I’ve always thought this thing you do every season is weird. You, like, willingly shut yourself off from any sort of contact with people. Except, like, me and the team. And you don’t even really talk to anyone that’s not me. Don’t you think that’s a little strange?” Calum explained.

Ashton let out a grunt of acknowledgment, but not really knowing what else to say.

“I didn’t mean to say that, though, okay? I might not understand why you do it, but I should respect it anyway. But, like, I’m gonna do my own thing, too. Not everyone has as much restraint as you do,” Calum finished, shoving his shoulder into Ashton’s playfully.

Ashton finally looked at the other boy, giving him a small smile.

“Yeah. I know. I’m starting to realize I’m not as good at this whole restraint thing as I thought I was,” Ashton said.

Ashton had kept most of the what went on between him and Luke to himself. He only really talked about it when Calum asked him what was up. But Calum knew that Ashton was struggling more and more as time passed by. Unfortunately, Calum wasn’t really full of wise advice. He usually just told Ashton to bone Luke and get it over with, his way of saying that he didn’t really know what Ashton should do.

“Maybe that’s a sign,” Calum responded, which made Ashton look over at him and Calum winked. 

“Oh, by the way, I’ll go with you to Luke’s. As long as Michael can come,” Calum finally answered, and Ashton was honestly only giving his best friend half of his attention at the moment. The other half was glued to Luke’s, who had just now entered the building. He also happened to be searching the room, his eyes landing on Ashton’s a moment later. The two of them smiled softly at each other, Ashton’s face heating up a little.

Ashton just shrugged. “Okay. I haven’t talked to Luke yet, but I think it should be fine.”

A little while later, after Ashton had warmed up and said hello to his mom and siblings, it was his turn for his first event. He’d be extremely tired later due to his four events today - two individual races and two relays. He’d definitely need to take a nap before he headed over to Luke’s.

He waited off to the side of the pool near the wall, slipping on his swim cap. He felt Luke standing next to him before the other boy actually spoke up.

“Hi,” he said, his voice quiet. Ashton smiled softly to himself - feeling like this was a repeat of the first time they spoke to each other. He looked up at the other boy, seeing Luke smiling back, probably thinking the same exact thing.

“Hi,” Ashton repeated.

“You look so good,” Luke said, his eyes wandering down Ashton’s frame, his eyes lingering at the boy’s stomach, right at the waistband of his swim uniform.

Ashton let out a low whine, shoving his shoulder into Luke’s to get the boy to stop. Luke giggled, letting his fingers tangle with Ashton’s for a moment before letting them go.

“I’m just teasing you, but I mean, you do look good,” Luke shrugged, smirking a tiny bit.

That definitely wasn’t helping Ashton. But did Ashton ask him to stop? No, absolutely not.

The two of them were interrupted a second later due to the fact that they had to take their marks. Ashton didn’t really get a chance to talk to Luke after the race either, once Ashton won. His coach lead him off to the side to congratulate him and discuss it in great detail. All he could manage was a secret smile as the two of them headed off in different directions.

Ashton didn’t get a chance to talk to Luke again until they both happened to be headed to the parking lot at the same time.

“So, do you still want to come over later?” Luke questioned, biting his lip as he waited for Ashton’s reply, stepping out of the door and into the early afternoon sunlight.

Ashton smiled, momentarily distracted by the brightness surrounding Luke like a halo. The boy seemed to glow even more than usual somehow. “Yeah, definitely. But, um, I asked Calum if he wanted to come, too. And Calum said that he’d come if Michael could. Is that okay?”

Luke immediately nodded, smiling, too. “I don’t mind that at all.”

“I’ll probably drive Calum. Should I, like, bring something? Food?” Ashton asked.

Luke shook his head, reaching forward to take Ashton’s hand in his, squeezing it a little bit. “No. You’re enough for me.”

Ashton sighed, stepping closer to the other boy. “You’re killing me…”

Luke looked down at their intertwined hands, letting his thumb rub softly against Ashton’s skin, not saying a word.

Yeah, Ashton would definitely need Calum and Michael there. They’d at least be some sort of buffer for any sort of sexual tension that might come up tonight. The last thing he needed was to be alone with Luke, especially when they were both struggling to keep their hands off of each other.

“I’ll see you later, yeah? Come over whenever,” Luke finally said, squeezing Ashton’s hand one last time before walking off.

After going home and taking a very long nap, Ashton called Calum, telling him to get ready because he’d be there in a few minutes. By the time he picked him up, Ashton felt fully rested. Calum seemed to be in better spirits, too, no longer suffering from the hangover. It was probably a combination of winning one of his events today as well as the anticipation of seeing Michael.

Luke answered the door with a wide smile on his face. The other two boys stepped inside, Ashton immediately going in for a big hug and holding Luke there for a heartbeat or two. The only reason they stopped was because they heard Calum clearing his throat.

Ashton pulled away from Luke, a little begrudgingly, but it was probably for the best.

In the car on the way over here, Calum had questioned why he was invited in the first place. 

“Because I want to hang out with you, Cal. Is that so weird?” Ashton answered, batting his eyes at his best friend once he was stopped at a red light.

Calum rolled his eyes, shaking his head but still managing to smile a little.

“ _Sure_. But I really think it’s because you’re afraid you’ll jump his bones but won’t admit it,” Calum guessed.

It was like this boy knew him too well. Ashton decided he’d have to get a better best friend and soon. Calum knew too much. He had to go.

“Calum, this is Luke. Luke, Calum.” Ashton backed off for a moment so the two of them could shake hands. In Ashton’s mind, he felt like the two of them knew enough about each other to know one another. But in reality, this was the first time they’d ever spoken. He was glad it was finally happening.

“Nice to meet you, Calum,” Luke said, holding his hand out while Calum took it. Calum smiled back - Ashton was surprised to find a genuine one on his face. Calum liked to give Ashton shit about not talking to a lot of people, but Calum was kind of shy sometimes, especially around people he’d never met before. Ashton was more than happy that he felt comfortable enough around Luke already.

“Same here, bro. Thanks for letting me come over, too. I know that you’d much rather be putting it in Ashton, so it’s really-”

“Excuse me!” Ashton interjected, glaring at Calum.

“What? I’m not _lying_ , am I?” Calum retorted, giving Ashton a pointed glance.

Ashton blushed furiously while Luke looked on, laughing a few seconds later. The two best friends continued to stare at each other, silently communicating.

“It’s true,” Luke replied, which caused both of the boys to look over at him. “But I don’t mind. As much as I’d rather get into Ash’s pants, this is still nice for me.”

Ashton balked, his mouth dropping open while Calum burst into laughter. This only caused Luke to laugh some more, the two boys erupting into fits as they watched Ashton’s expression.

“I can’t believe you two. Laughing at my expense. Go ahead, I’ll just be over here in the corner pouting,” Ashton said, stomping off down the hallway, even though he didn’t know where it led to.

The boys followed him as they continued to laugh.

But Ashton felt his slight embarrassment slip away as he continued down the long hallway, his attention captured by the photographs on the wall. They varied from entire family photos to just single shots of Luke and his brothers, sometimes all three of them. Ashton felt mesmerized, seeing all of these different family moments. He stopped at one where Luke was by himself, a picture that had to be when he was just a toddler. But he knew it was Luke, even if Ashton didn’t know what the other boys looked like as kids.

He felt his heart squeeze tightly in his chest, even though he didn’t know why. The sight of Luke as a small child made him smile.

“Ashton?” He turned to the sound of his name being called, seeing Luke standing at the end of the hallway, giving him a quizzical look.

Ashton just smiled and turned back to the photo. “This is really cute.”

Luke joined him a moment later, standing behind Ashton as he looked on.

Luke shook his head once he saw what Ashton was talking about, looking back at the boy. “No, oh God. Of all the pictures…”

Ashton turned to face him, still smiling widely up at Luke.

“I think you look adorable. I love it.”

Luke managed to look bashful, taking Ashton’s hand in his. “Come on, we’ve left Cal to pick out a movie.”

The two of them walked into Luke’s living room and found Calum searching through the shelf of movies in the corner. Ashton let go of Luke’s hand and approached Calum, looking over the shelf himself. He noticed Calum already had two DVD cases in his hand, trying to decide between them.

“Not Anchorman again, _please_ ,” Ashton begged. “We’ve watched it a million times and I’m so sick of it.”

“Excuse me, that is sacrilege. Don’t make me pick between you and Ron Burgundy. You’re not gonna like what I have to say,” Calum stated, but put the movie back on the shelf. Ashton smiled happily.

“Star Wars? That’s kinda long, Cal,” Ashton commented on the other one a second later.

Calum made an annoyed sound. “Are you gonna shoot down every single thing I pick out?”

Ashton grinned and put his hands up, backing away over to Luke who was giggling behind him.

“If that’s what you want to watch, that’s fine,” Ashton said, finding himself giggling alongside Luke.

Calum rolled his eyes and shuffled toward them, holding out the DVD case to Luke who smiled and took it. 

“When is Michael gonna get here?” Ashton asked, plopping down onto one of the couches.

Luke checked his phone, looking at the time before answering. “He said he was running late because he had to shower. But that was, like, five minutes before you got here. So, I’m guessing he should be here soon.”

Calum also checked his phone, too, grinning widely at whatever he saw on the screen. He quickly typed something before looking up. “He’ll be here in a minute. He just texted me and he was at the stop sign down the road.”

Ashton made himself comfortable on the couch, watching as Luke headed toward the TV and began setting everything up for the movie. Calum took a seat on the other smaller couch, completely stretching himself out, putting a pillow behind his head.

Luke got the main menu on the screen when Ashton heard a loud knock on the front door. Luke quickly stood up and trotted down to the hallway. Ashton also heard a loud _hi!_ and a lower one, a voice that definitely belonged to Luke. Shuffling noises crept down the hall again and Michael entered into the room. 

Out of instinct, Ashton kind of tensed up when he saw the boy. It was from weeks of having to be wary of the kid, not too sure what his intentions were with his best friend. But Ashton watched as Michael immediately made his way over to Calum, draping himself over his best friend who was still stretched out onto the couch. The way they sweetly greeted one another, both looking happy as ever just to be in one another’s presence, was a little unexpected.

For whatever reason, it made Ashton’s chest ache. He was so happy for his best friend all of a sudden. Calum deserved it, deserved someone who would treat him like the amazing guy he was. But at the same time, Ashton felt sad. He wanted that, too. He wanted it so badly.

He looked over at Luke but was surprised to find the boy’s eyes already on his. Luke was giving him a soft look, a small smile appearing on his face.

He came and sat down next to Ashton a moment later, grabbing the remote control and pressing play. He didn’t sit as close as Ashton would have liked, but he stayed silent, not wanting to push anything.

It was about twenty minutes into the movie when Luke scooted himself as close as he could possibly get to Ashton.

He laid his head down on Ashton’s shoulder, letting it rest there for several long minutes. Ashton put an arm that wrapped around his waist, holding him close.

“Do you want to lay down together?” Luke whispered, propping his chin up on Ashton’s shoulder now. Ashton looked over at Luke, happy that the other boy was suggesting it.

He nodded, lifting himself up off of the couch, waiting for Luke to lay down first. Once he did and made enough room for Ashton, he laid down in front of him, Luke’s body resting against Ashton’s backside. Luke placed an arm around Ashton’s waist, bringing them a little bit closer. Ashton nestled back into Luke’s arms, feeling the other boy’s chest rising and falling behind him. This was entirely too nice, almost to the point where he didn’t really have words to describe it.

He wanted to hate moments like this. It gave him glimpses of everything he could have, peeks into a future with Luke. If it was possible, it made his resolve crack even more than it already was. Now, there was a gaping hole in his life that he was missing and it was in the shape of Luke Hemmings.

He really began to wonder if all of the waiting, the obsessive focus on swimming, was worth it. But, knowing that he’d have Luke no matter what after it was all over made it a little bit easier. Only a little.

About halfway through the movie, Michael voiced that he was starving.

“Mom gave me money to order some pizza. Is that okay?” Luke asked, his mouth directly next to Ashton’s ear, tickling the hair there and causing him to giggle. Luke squeezed his side lightly, letting his nose graze against Ashton’s neck for a moment.

“Duh. Can we order it now?” Michael pleaded, sitting up from his comfortable cuddle with Calum to look over at Luke.

Luke nodded, pushing back against Ashton to signal that they should get up. Luke paused the movie after he sat up straight again, all four of them loping into the kitchen.

For what seemed like several long minutes, they all argued about what pizzas they wanted. Michael insisted a meat-lovers one, since he couldn’t pick one meat topping that he liked. 

“Why not all of them?” he asked, but his question was just met by Calum’s snorting.

Calum wanted just cheese, and Luke agreed, both not too interested in a ton of toppings on their pizza. Ashton really wanted Hawaiian, but no one else liked it. He still attempted to argue in favor of it, saying that they could just pick off the pineapple pieces if they didn’t want to try it. Everyone just kind of gave him strange looks. Michael also said that he wouldn’t mind having a vegetable one, too, and Ashton thought that was a little excessive.

Eventually, they all settled on one meat-lovers and two cheese. At that point, Ashton didn’t even care. His stomach would agree with just about anything that was edible. 

Once the pizza got there, they all gathered around in front of the TV with the boxes, continuing the movie and yelling loudly at the exciting parts.

Ashton learned a little bit more about Michael during this part. The boy loved Star Wars, just like he did. And they both had the same opinions about it and infinitely more knowledge than the other two boys.

He also got to see Calum and Michael interact a little more. It felt completely different from the few other times Ashton had been in their presence. Michael always seemed so indifferent to Calum, which made Ashton think that maybe he was playing hard to get. He knew that it had been frustrating for Calum, though, even if his best friend would never admit it.

At one point, Ashton’s knee bumped against Luke’s, and Ashton apologized quietly. Luke just shook his head, not moving away from the small contact and only smiling as he chewed a piece of pizza.

“God, you two are so gross. Why don’t you just get together already?” Michael said, glancing between both Luke and Ashton.

Ashton felt his face heat up a little bit, kind of embarrassed that this was something that was actually happening. He looked over at Michael, who had raised his eyebrow up at Ashton, a look that told him that Michael knew pretty much everything.

Ashton squirmed a little in his spot on the carpet, finishing his current slice of pizza. It was one thing explaining the situation to Calum, who was his best friend, or Luke, who insisted that he understood and would wait. But it was quite another having to do it with a third party outsider. And truthfully, Ashton didn’t really think it was any of Michael’s business. He had a feeling that the boy would only judge him and tell him how stupid he was being. If Ashton was correct judging by Michael’s body language, Calum or Luke had already told him everything anyway.

“Well,” Ashton began, pausing for a second. “Why aren’t you and Calum together?” It was probably a shitty thing to do, deviating away from the attention, but he didn’t know what else to do.

All Michael did was take another bite of pizza, not even blinking as he replied. “We are together.”

Ashton choked on what he was chewing, completely surprised to hear those words come out of his mouth. At first he thought it was a joke, so he looked over at Calum. All he saw was his best friend giving him a bashful smile, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.

“Cal? What? Why didn’t you say anything?” Ashton wasn’t mad about the turn of events. He was just upset that his best friend never mentioned it. 

Calum was still all-smiles, not really perturbed by Ashton’s obvious surprise. “It ‘officially’ happened earlier today. Was gonna tell you later.” Calum used air quotes around _officially_ , which meant they’d been together for longer than that.

Ashton huffed, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Okay, well, you still didn’t answer my question,” Michael continued, smirking over at Ashton.

“Chill, Mikey. He doesn’t have to answer you,” Luke jumped in, having been quiet this whole time. Ashton gave him a grateful look, but stared back down at his lap.

Michael was quiet for a second before saying something. “I know you like each other. I don’t see the issue, that’s all I’m trying to say.”

Ashton felt his chest kind of tighten up a little, suddenly overwhelmed by his choices. It was hard hearing someone who really didn’t know him that well say things like that. It wasn’t Michael’s fault and Ashton wasn’t mad at him or anything. He understood his confusion - why can’t two people who both like each other be together? It was a good question.

“Ashton’s just trying to focus,” Luke said, attempting to explain everything to Michael.

Michael shrugged in response.

“I kind of see it as a compliment, you know? He thinks I’m so hot he can’t even concentrate when I’m around,” Luke continued, laughing softly as he finished speaking. Ashton could see the boy look at him out of the corner of his eye, but Ashton was too busy continuing to stare at his lap. 

Ashton could feel his throat tighten up along with his chest. He really didn’t want to be here for this conversation anymore. He had a difficult time enough dealing with this himself. It was harder to hear other people disagree with his decisions. And it was even worse hearing Luke try and defend him, assuring him that he was fine with all of this, even though Ashton didn’t know how he could be.

“Just think it’s kinda weird,” Michael mumbled, shrugging again.

Ashton felt stupidly upset in that moment, a small pressure forming in the corners of his eyes, tears threatening to spill over. He didn’t want anyone to see him cry either, so he rushed to stand up, probably scaring the other three.

“I- um, I’m sorry. I have to, like, I have to go to the bathroom,” he stammered out, bolting out of the room and down the other hallway, the one Luke had mentioned held the bathroom earlier.

By the time he reached the room, it became even harder to control his tears. He had to squeeze his eyes shut to keep them from falling and he wasn’t certain how long that would actually last.

Ashton hated that he got like this, hated how emotional he could be. It was difficult for him, though. He spent most of his life hiding all of his feelings, trying to put on a brave face for either his mom or siblings or whoever. He didn’t want to seem weak or upset over the smallest things, but it usually built up so much that he could no longer keep it inside. Michael’s words just hit him harder than normal. Just like Calum’s words had upset him earlier in the day.

He’d only known Luke for a few weeks and he was already breaking down like this. It made him feel like even more of an idiot. This shouldn’t even be upsetting him, but well. Here he was.

He frantically pawed at his eyes, desperately willing the pressure behind them to cease. His chest was so tight and it was becoming more and more difficult to breathe. All he could do was sit on the ground, his knees up to his chest, and think about Luke.

The last thing Ashton wanted was to worry the boy, but he probably was. The way he’d left that conversation hadn’t been subtle and he hoped that he wasn’t going to make everything awkward.

He didn’t know how long he’d been in there when there was a knock on the door.

“It’s me,” a soft voice said, one that could only belong to Luke.

Ashton said nothing, only sniffed and stayed still on the ground. Luke timidly opened the door, peeking his head inside. Once Luke saw him on the ground, he hurriedly entered the room, shutting the door closed behind him quietly.

“Ash, what’s wrong?” he asked, bending his tall frame down until he was kneeling in front of Ashton.

“I’m sorry,” Ashton said, ignoring the question because he felt so embarrassed, which made the tears even harder to contain. He immediately covered his face up, not wanting Luke to see him like this. He could feel his face heat up, flushed from how stupid his exit from the conversation was and Luke finding him curled up on the bathroom floor like this.

Ashton heard shuffling and felt Luke’s hands come up to his own, pulling them away from his face. He didn’t even try to fight it. Luke’s arms wrapped around him a moment later, which made Ashton bury his face in the boy’s chest. He brought his own arms around Luke’s neck, clinging onto him without really meaning to. The comfort he was feeling was undeniable, and he didn’t realize how much he needed Luke until right now.

“Ash, you have to tell me what’s wrong,” Luke repeated, his voice sounding a little more worried than he probably meant for it to. The boy’s hands were rubbing up and down his back in a comforting gesture, so Ashton tried to concentrate on that feeling.

He let out a sharp breath, a stray tear escaping. “I’m so sorry,” was all he could manage to say.

“I don’t know what you’re sorry about. You’ve done nothing wrong,” Luke replied, his mouth right next to Ashton’s ear, speaking so gently that it made Ashton’s heart squeeze tightly. This boy was too good for him, too patient and sweet. He wasn’t sure if he deserved that. It made him want to cry even harder.

He quickly pulled back and away from Luke, looking him in the face. Luke’s blue eyes were wide, apprehension and worry clouding them as well as his face.

Instead of answering him verbally, Ashton leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to Luke’s lips.

He could tell that he’d surprised Luke. The boy visibly froze, his lips unmoving against Ashton’s. Ashton barely moved his either, mostly because he wasn’t sure how Luke would react.

Luke pulled back quickly after it began, an eyebrow raised in confusion at Ashton.

“Ash, what-”

“I need you,” he interrupted, moving forward to give Luke another kiss, but he angled his face away instead, a frown gracing his features.

It was Ashton’s turn to freeze, kind of taken aback by Luke’s reaction.

“I’m sorry, I, like, I thought that you still wanted that. Sorry,” Ashton stumbled over his words, pushing himself back away from Luke, worried he’d made the boy uncomfortable.

Luke squinted, shaking his head a little and pulling Ashton back closer. “No, like, yeah. Wait. I do want that. Really, I swear. I just thought that, you know, you said you had to wait?”

Ashton felt another tear fall down his face and attempted to wipe it away before Luke noticed. But the other boy definitely noticed.

Luke let out a frustrated sound, but seemed to be waiting for Ashton to say something. Ashton just kind of sat there, staring at Luke’s chest, not really knowing what to do.

“I’m so confused. Can you, like, please tell me what’s going on? I’m really worried about you,” Luke said, voicing his concern, his hands still rubbing soothingly against Ashton’s back.

“I don’t want to wait anymore,” Ashton finally said, still not looking Luke in the eye.

He felt Luke’s breath hitch, the movement against Ashton’s back ceasing, but the boy didn’t stay silent for more than a solid two seconds. “Ashton…”

“No, I’m serious.” Ashton barely glanced up at Luke, only from underneath his lashes.

Luke was clearly shocked, but tried to compose his features while he replied.

“But, why? Why now?” Luke asked.

Ashton guessed Luke deserved an explanation but there really hadn’t been one. He felt like he’d been pushed to the edge of something and he felt like there was no other option but to move forward with Luke.

“Because. I just, I think I’m ready. I want to try this,” Ashton tried but failed at explaining this eloquently. 

Luke still looked skeptical. “But, you’ve been fine, right? Like, we’ve been okay. You’ve been pretty patient.”

Ashton just laughed, no amusement in the sound. “Not really. I’d say I’ve been hanging on by a pretty pathetic thread recently.”

“Ashton, I don’t want this to be some last resort thing for you. Something you think you have to do with me,” Luke blurted out quickly, seeming a little shocked himself that he managed to say something like that.

Ashton opened his mouth to protest, but couldn’t think of anything to say. That wasn’t true, at least not for him. He’d never see Luke as someone he felt obligated to pursue.

“That’s not how I feel about you at all,” he replied, frowning at the other boy.

Luke closed his eyes for a second, taking a deep breath before opening them again. “It kinda feels like it.”

“What? Why?” Ashton questioned, completely confused. The last thing he would have ever wanted was to make Luke feel like he wasn’t someone Ashton cared about, that he didn’t want to be with.

“Like, you’re obviously upset about what Mikey said. That’s why you’re in here, right?” Ashton gave a noncommittal shrug, which was apparently enough of an answer for Luke to continue. “I know he shouldn’t have said that stuff. But, now all of a sudden you’re, like, wanting to be with me after you were pretty adamant about your no-relationships thing and staying focused on swimming. It makes me feel like you think you have to do this.”

“No, Luke-”

“Yeah, there’s not really any other way to feel about it right now,” the other boy interrupted, sighing and scooting himself backward a little, away from Ashton, his arms inadvertently dropping down and away from Luke because of the movement.

Ashton felt completely defeated, his throat closing up all over again. He thought that Luke had been totally wrong at first, but now that the boy had explained himself a little more, Ashton could see why it would appear that way. And maybe, in a way, Luke was right. 

“You know I like you, right? That this is all I want?” Ashton asked, desperate for Luke to know how he felt. He thought he’d been obvious when maybe he really hadn’t been.

If the roles were reversed, Ashton knew he’d feel the same way. Having someone tell you they’re not ready to date you seems like a form of rejection. Having someone tell you they’re not ready because they need to focus on something else, that there’s this other thing that’s more important, is also super shitty. Luke had obviously handled it way better than Ashton ever would have, but if the boy was insecure about this entire thing, Ashton would never blame him. In fact, it only prompted him to prove him wrong.

Luke sighed again, rubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes before pulling them away. “I don’t know what I know.”

Ashton swallowed loudly, feeling like absolute shit. And, like, it was all his fault, but that should mean he should be able to fix it, right?

The problem was that he had absolutely no fucking idea how to do that.

“I think, I think I need some time to myself, yeah?” Luke continued, not waiting for Ashton to speak up first.

“Do you, um, want me to go?” Ashton asked, biting his lip, trying to stop the tears from coming, even though they were beginning to form in the corners of his eyes. 

Luke hesitated for a second before finally nodding, which made Ashton’s stomach drop.

He really had screwed everything up now. Luke didn’t even want him here anymore. He wanted him to go so that he could think about what all of this meant. And that scared him. Really, he’d been anticipating this since the beginning, since he and Luke first started this weird flirting thing when they first met. He’d been waiting for the moment when Luke would realize that he deserved way more than what Ashton was willing to give him.

Ashton had been surprised by Luke’s initial reaction. And the boy had seemed really fine these past few weeks. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, or Ashton projecting his own false assurances onto the other boy.

“Oh. Um, yeah, okay,” Ashton stammered out, standing up quickly, watching Luke slowly unfold himself from off of the ground, hovering next to Ashton without looking at him. “I guess I’ll tell Cal. I’ll take him home and stuff.”

Luke just nodded in response while Ashton turned around, opening up the bathroom door. The boys walked silently back into the living area. Ashton noticed that Calum and Michael were sitting on the couch again, but seemed to be waiting for the appearance of the other two. 

The second Ashton made eye contact with Calum, his best friend shot up from his previous seat, concern washing over his face. He raised his eyebrows up at Ashton who just shook his head a little, telling Calum _not now_ without actually saying anything.

“Ashton, I’m really sorry about all that stuff I said,” Michael quickly said, his face looking remorseful and almost made Ashton feel worse than he already did. None of this was Michael’s fault and he hated that he’d made Michael feel that way.

“It’s fine. Like, you didn’t do anything,” Ashton said, giving the dirty blonde boy a weak smile. Michael only nodded in response.

Awkward silence filled the room as no one said anything.

“Um, we’re gonna go now,” Ashton spoke again, finally breaking the odd tension that had suddenly appeared, looking over at Calum as he finished talking.

“Oh,” Calum responded, turning back to look at Michael for a second before his gaze shifted between Luke and Ashton. “Okay.”

“Thank for, uh, having me over,” Ashton said, half-turning to speak to Luke, not looking at him directly, too scared that he’d start crying once he saw those beautiful blue eyes. He’d have to save that breakdown for later.

Luke didn’t say anything, just followed both Calum and Ashton to the front door, Michael right beside him.

Calum and Michael briefly said goodbye and Ashton was sure he heard Michael say _see you later_ , Calum kissing him on the cheek before they walked out into the night.

Ashton tried not to read too much into Luke immediately shutting the door before Ashton had even driven away.

Calum said nothing as they continued driving down the street, headed in no particular direction. But Ashton could tell the other boy was itching to, could feel the apprehension rolling off of him in waves, his knee bouncing impatiently in the seat next to him.

“Would you quit that?” Ashton blurted, immediately feeling guilty for lashing out at Calum when he wasn’t even doing anything wrong.

“Ash, what’s wrong?” Calum finally asked, completely ignoring his outburst.

The thing was, he couldn’t talk about it. Not right now. If he talked about it, he’d cry and he couldn’t cry. The last thing he needed to do was cry.

“I, I don’t-”

“Tell me,” Calum demanded, his voice unwavering.

At that exact moment, Ashton drove by the park that was close to his house, the parking lot completely empty. He pulled over immediately, not wanting to lose control of the vehicle when he inevitably started crying. 

Calum looked completely worried once Ashton looked over at him again. But he was patient as Ashton relayed all of what had happened, immediately throwing his arms around Ashton when the tears silently fell from his eyes.

“I don’t know what I should do,” he mumbled into Calum’s sweatshirt.

Calum huffed, which was his way of saying that he didn’t really either.

“I fucked everything up,” Ashton continued, falling into a bottomless pit of self-loathing and feeling sorry for himself.

He could feel Calum shaking his head. “No, you didn’t. It just sounds like Luke wants to figure everything out. What he wants and stuff.”

“I thought he wanted me,” Ashton said weakly.

Calum said nothing for a really long time.

“He does. You just have to prove him wrong. Show him that you’re ready,” Calum replied, pulling back away from hugging Ashton and giving him a small smile. “But you have to give him some time first. He’s obviously pretty serious about that.”

That was what scared Ashton the most. If he gave Luke enough time to think all of this through, he’d probably come to the conclusion that Ashton was not worth his time and that he deserved way better. And he’d probably be right.

“I know,” Ashton sighed, wiping at his face. He turned back to face the steering wheel, staring off ahead into the darkness.

“He wants you. I promise that he’ll come around.” Calum’s words weren’t as reassuring as he probably intended them to be, but Ashton knew his best friend was trying. That made him feel a little better.

“Do you want me to stay over with you? We can cuddle and watch all of your favorite movies. I’ll even let you watch that weird _Ninja Turtles_ movie you like so much,” Calum suggested, nudging his elbow into Ashton’s arm, making Ashton smile softly and shake his head.

“It’s a classic!” he defended, but felt slightly better from Calum’s attempts at comfort. “And yeah, you can stay.”

The boys headed back to Ashton’s, pulling into the driveway when Ashton remembered something.

“Didn’t Michael say he was seeing you later?” Ashton asked, climbing out of his car and pocketing his keys.

Calum shrugged. “Yeah, but I’ll text him and tell him I’m hanging with you instead.” The way he said it made it seem like it was an obvious choice, which made Ashton feel a little warm inside. “He’ll understand.”

In that moment, Ashton decided that he liked Michael. When Calum was pining after the boy, it really wasn’t the same. It sometimes felt like Calum was trying really hard to be something that he wasn’t in order to gain Michael’s attention. But now that everything was okay, now that they were officially together, Calum was back to normal. The best part was that Calum actually seemed really happy. Michael wasn’t asking him to be something else, he was just Calum. 

The boys spent their night together, Calum constantly checking up on Ashton, but not being too overbearing about it.

Unfortunately, Ashton couldn’t really take his mind off of Luke. He kept his phone in his hand the entire night, even waking up with it in his grip, but he heard nothing.

It was safe to say Ashton was pretty miserable.

***

By the time Calum left, Ashton thought that he’d be okay. He managed to distract himself for several hours by catching up on homework, even watching TV with Harry for a little while.

When the sun started setting, he was pacing his bedroom, staring at his phone in his hand. Should he text Luke? Should he initiate some sort of contact?

His brain told him no. He should honestly try and find whatever semblance of patience he had left inside of him and use it for this situation. But his gut told him a different story. He had to prove Luke wrong.

The first thing he needed to do was figure out what he wanted, though. Last night, Luke had said that he felt like Ashton saw this as something he had to do instead of what he wanted. When he thought more about it, Ashton knew that was how he felt at the time. He’d desperately tried to get Luke to go along with moving forward when he didn’t think about how Luke would see it.

In the light of the next day, Ashton knew that wasn’t the case, even if that’s how Luke really felt. He went over his reasons for keeping his metaphorical distance from Luke and he found that they didn’t really make sense anymore.

Ashton was doing better than he’d ever done in swimming, almost like Luke’s presence propelled him forward, to do better. His coach kept telling him that he was certain that Ashton could have a future in swimming, if he wanted it. That was all Ashton could have asked for, really. He wanted options. He still hadn’t decided if he wanted to swim after high school or not, but it appeared that he could if that’s what he wanted. Ashton never felt pressured to make a decision either way and he still didn’t feel like he had to.

Luke was never a distraction. He only made Ashton happy. Who cares if Luke was a pretty big focus for him? That didn’t take anything away from swimming. It apparently only made things better.

It was a pretty easy decision once he admitted that to himself. If Luke wasn’t a distraction, if being in a relationship with him wouldn’t hurt Ashton at all, then what was he waiting for?

It took Luke being disappointed in him to see that. He never wanted the boy to be mad at him again and he’d do whatever it took to make that happen.

Ashton really wasn’t above big romantic gestures. For this particular situation, he wasn’t sure big would work well.

He came up with a simple idea, one that he needed to do now before it got too late.

He grabbed his wallet and his car keys, quickly heading to the local flower shop. He was worried that they wouldn’t be open at this time, but luckily they were.

After Ashton got what he needed, he drove over to Luke’s.

He noticed that there weren’t any other cars parked outside, which meant that there was a possibility no one was home. He thought maybe he should text Luke to see, but he was too afraid that the boy wouldn’t answer.

Instead, he rang the doorbell, holding a bouquet of flowers in his hands, chewing on his bottom lip nervously. This was probably the most anxious he’d been in his entire life - that included all the times before big, important swim meets. Ashton would never forgive himself if he couldn’t make things right with Luke.

About a minute later - although it honestly felt like a year - a sleepy, ragged-looking Luke opened the front door, rubbing one of his eyes.

“Ashton?” he exclaimed, his eyes opening wide once he realized who it was. Obviously, Luke hadn’t been expecting him.

“Uh, yeah. It’s me,” he answered, letting out a nervous giggle. Even though he looked tired and groggy, Luke was still cute as ever and it only managed to make Ashton that much more nervous.

Luke didn’t say anything. But Ashton watched as the boy’s blank stare shifted down to the flowers in his hand and a small redness crept into Luke’s cheeks.

“Are, um, those for me?” Luke asked, mimicking Ashton and biting on his own lip.

Ashton nodded, smiling a little as he held out the arrangement to Luke. “They’re tulips. I mean, obviously they’re tulips. You can see that. The, uh, white ones mean forgiveness. Or that’s what the florist told me.”

Ashton knew he was rambling so he shut himself up, awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck.

Luke was staring down at the flowers for a long time, right before looking back up at Ashton.

“And the yellow ones?”

Ashton swallowed loudly, feeling like this was the moment that would change everything. He felt his stomach clench in nervousness, almost like he could throw up if he thought about it anymore. He just needed to go for it.

“Hopelessly in love,” Ashton whispered back, watching Luke’s face carefully for his reaction.

Luke’s eyebrows shot up, his mouth falling open, clearly not expecting that to come out of Ashton’s mouth.

He didn’t say anything, though, and Ashton was beginning to worry. He shifted from foot to foot, his hands anxiously wringing together as he waited for Luke to say something.

“You love me?” Luke questioned, which, like. Yeah, Ashton was expecting this part. He didn’t know why it wasn’t obvious, but he guessed he it was his turn to explain.

“Yes. I’m crazy about you. I realize that last night was bad. I know how it must have seemed to you, like I was just doing that because I thought that’s what I had to do.

“I know you wanted me to give you some time, but I kept thinking that I had to show you. Or explain myself. Or something. I really do love you, Luke. And I thought about it a lot and, like, you aren’t a distraction. You just make me happy. There’s nothing that makes me happy like you do. Not even swimming. Which, like, I’m doing fine with. I’ve actually gotten better this season. You haven’t even distracted me from that for a second.

“It was easy to figure out that I loved you. I’ve never felt anything like this in my life and you’re all I think about and I want to make you happy, too. You told me a few weeks ago that you’d be there for me when I was ready. I’m positive that I’m ready now,” Ashton finished, taking a deep breath.

Luke’s face hadn’t changed much throughout that speech. He just stared at Ashton, holding the flowers close to his chest.

Finally, he spoke up. “Are you sure?”

Ashton let out a small, sharp laugh and nodded. “Yeah, Lukey. I’m sure.”

Instead of say anything else, Luke turned around suddenly walking back into his house and leaving Ashton to stand there on the front steps. He blinked in surprise, not really sure what was going on here.

Luke returned a moment later, right before Ashton was sure his heart was going to burst out of his chest in anticipation. The flowers were no longer in his hands, which were now reaching out to pull Ashton forward and. Oh.

Now they were kissing.

Luke’s lips moved eagerly against Ashton’s, exactly how Ashton remembered they had the first time. Ashton didn’t waste a single second, wrapping his arms around the taller boy’s neck, the two of them stumbling backward into Luke’s house. Ashton thought he heard the sound of the front door closing, probably due to Luke kicking it shut as they continued their kisses.

Luke’s hands found Ashton’s waist, no longer gripping tightly onto the material at the front his shirt. Ashton had no idea where Luke was leading him, too busy moving his lips intensely against the other boy’s.

At one point, Ashton felt one of Luke’s hands leave his side and he thought he heard another door opening. That was when he finally pulled his head away, seeing them moving into Luke’s bedroom.

Luke’s mouth didn’t stop, however, and was now making it’s way down Ashton’s jaw until he reached his neck. Ashton felt his eyes flutter closed, his breath catching at the feeling of Luke kissing him there. 

“Luke,” he breathed out, pawing at the boy’s shoulders, attempting to push him back. Ashton wasn’t so secure in himself to believe that just because Luke was kissing him that this meant something.

“What? What is it? Are you okay?” Luke asked and Ashton almost started laughing at the concern washing over the other boy’s features.

“Yeah, I’m good,” he giggled, but stopped himself so that the two of them could go back to being serious. As much as Ashton loved kissing Luke, they needed to talk. “Um, I just. Are we okay?”

“Oh,” Luke said, shaking his head a little and smiling bashfully. “I meant to say that I love you, too, but I kind of got distracted by wanting to kiss you…”

Ashton felt his face heat up, unable to hide the huge smile taking over his face. Luke smiled back, all-dimples and shining blue eyes.

“I love you so much,” Luke whispered, leaning his forehead against Ashton’s, the hands on his waist squeezing softly.

Ashton didn’t hesitate to kiss Luke again. It was his own way of containing the squeal that had threatened to escape his lips at hearing Luke say that he loved him. 

Luke smiled into the kiss for a few moments, tugging Ashton backward until they both fell onto the boy’s bed, Ashton on top of him. They scooted back until they were comfortably situated on top of Luke’s blankets. Ashton realized then that he hadn’t really had a chance to look around at Luke’s bedroom - he made a mental note to do that later.

Luke’s mouth found Ashton’s neck again, a definite weak spot for him, and Ashton whined and squirmed on top of the other boy.

Luke pushed back against Ashton, his lips not leaving Ashton’s skin as he sat up on the bed, pulling Ashton into his lap. Ashton happily straddled him, one of his hands finding it’s way into Luke’s hair, tugging on the ends. This caused Luke to let out a small whimper, the vibrations against Ashton’s neck made him break out into goosebumps.

“Shouldn’t we, um, stop? Your parents…” Ashton’s voice trailed off, his tone of voice indicating that he didn’t want to stop at all. But he was trying to be careful. It seemed that Ashton would be around for quite a while and he didn’t want to get caught and somehow get on anyone’s bad side before anything had a chance to begin.

Luke nipped at Ashton’s skin, earning a small yelp before he laughed, pulling away to look Ashton in the eye. “They won’t be home until late again. So, it looks like I have you all to myself.”

Luke pinched Ashton’s side, causing Ashton to squirm again and playfully shove Luke’s shoulder.

“That’s good because I’d like to take my time with you,” Ashton murmured, watching Luke’s eyes widen at the implication.

Their mouths reattached, but this time they knew they didn’t have to go so quickly. After several long moments, Luke opened his mouth for Ashton, his tongue sweeping inside until it pressed against Luke’s, earning a low groan from the other boy.

Luke’s hands trailed down until they fingered the edge of Ashton’s shirt, pushing it upward until he felt skin. Ashton shivered at the contact, reminding him of the only other time he’d felt Luke’s hands on him like this.

It was hard to contain himself after that.

Instead of waiting for Luke to ask permission, like the good boy he was, Ashton pulled his lips away in order to take his shirt off, tossing it off to the side. 

While this wasn’t the first time Luke had ever seen Ashton shirtless, the boy’s gaze never left his chest, trailing all the way down to Ashton’s lower stomach. Luke’s hands moved forward from around his waist until they moved all over Ashton’s torso, rubbing him up and down. Ashton was out of breath, unable to breathe normally anymore, not while Luke touched him like this. He absolutely lost it once Luke trailed his fingers over Ashton’s nipples, causing him to choke out a moan.

“ _Luke_ ,” Ashton whimpered, his head burying into Luke’s neck, overwhelmed by the feeling of Luke’s hands on him.

“What do you want?” Luke asked, his voice breathy and low, which was nearly killing Ashton.

His cock was already hardening in his jeans and they’d barely even started anything. Luke was going to drive him absolutely crazy.

“Want you naked,” Ashton mumbled, his lips grazing Luke’s skin, feeling the boy shudder underneath him.

At that request, Luke managed to slide Ashton off to the side, pushing himself off of his bed and removing every single item of clothing from his body.

Ashton swallowed loudly, not taking his eyes off of Luke’s hard cock, wanting nothing more than to get his mouth around it. So that was exactly what Ashton was going to do next.

He immediately lifted himself up, kneeling down on the ground. He moved his hands to the back of Luke’s thighs, pushing him back toward the bed, signaling for him to sit down.

“Ash, you don’t have to-”

“But I want to,” Ashton interrupted, managing to lift his gaze up to Luke’s eyes for a split second, smirking a little, before wrapping his mouth around Luke’s dick.

Luke immediately let out a whimper, just as Ashton started giving kitten licks to the head. His hand wrapped around the base, pumping once, twice, right before taking all of Luke into his mouth. The tip hit the back of Ashton’s throat, causing him to gag and pull back. Luke’s head fell back, his stomach visibly quivering from the feeling Ashton was giving him. It was probably the hottest thing he’d ever seen in his life.

Ashton continued bobbing his head up and down, alternating between hollowing out his cheeks and letting his tongue lick graciously around Luke’s cock. At one point, Luke bucked his hips upward, fucking into Ashton’s mouth. It was clearly an accident if Luke’s profuse apologies following it were anything to go by.

Ashton pulled his mouth away, smirking again. “It’s okay. Kinda like it.”

Luke groaned again, even louder this time. Ashton couldn’t help but palm over his own jeans at the noises Luke was making, his mouth finding Luke’s cock again. This time, Luke didn’t stop himself from moving his hips, actually fucking Ashton’s mouth this time. Ashton made sure to keep increasing his pace, wanting to see Luke turn into an absolute mess.

It didn’t take long before Luke was whining, attempting to push Ashton off of him.

“What’s wrong?” Ashton asked, a knowing smile gracing his features.

Luke grabbed at his shoulders, pulling him back up. Instead of verbalizing what he wanted, he unbuttoned Ashton’s jeans, shoving them down his legs in answer to his question. Ashton just smiled wider, stepping back to help Luke out and slipping out of his pants. His boxers came down with them.

Ashton tried not to let the fact that he heard Luke’s breath hitch go to his head.

Luke immediately grabbed at Ashton’s hips, pulling him back forward into his lap, the same position as before. Being completely naked, straddling Luke, was almost too much for Ashton.

Their lips came together again, frantically kissing, their hands roaming over each other’s skin. Ashton moaned into Luke’s mouth when he felt the other boy’s hand wrap around his cock, pumping him up and down.

“Luke, _please_ ,” Ashton begged, not exactly sure what he was pleading for.

“What do you want, baby?” Luke asked, repeating the same question as before, letting Ashton direct this entire thing.

“Can, can I ride you?” Ashton questioned, staring into Luke’s big, blue eyes, watching the boy nod in answer.

Luke continued moving his hand up and down Ashton, which was making his muscles feel like they were turning to jelly. He really needed Luke to hurry, or he was going to come right then and there.

“ _Luke_ ,” he whined again, jerking his hips up into Luke’s grip.

Luke let out a soft laugh, his hand finally letting go of Ashton and smacking his butt lightly. “Lube’s in the night table.”

Ashton rolled his eyes at the lazy boy underneath him, shifting himself momentarily off of Luke in order to reach into the drawer of the table next to Luke’s bed. He grabbed the bottle, shoving the drawer closed as he moved himself back into Luke’s lap.

He handed the lube over to Luke, who opened it up, squeezing it out onto his fingers.

Ashton was suddenly extremely nervous watching this happen. He’d only been with one boy before this, and the experience hadn’t been exactly satisfying or enjoyable. But, he realized that he’d felt completely comfortable with Luke up until now, that there hadn’t been a single moment of hesitation on his part. He had no reason to fear that Luke wouldn’t take absolute care of him, who wouldn’t make sure he was okay the entire time.

“You ready for me?” Luke asked, possibly sensing Ashton’s momentary fear. He nodded, not trusting his voice to not sound scared shitless right then.

Luke shifted forward, his lips finding Ashton’s in a searing kiss, completely distracting him from his previous thoughts. Ashton wrapped his arms around Luke’s neck, kissing him back with equal fervor. Ashton felt Luke’s finger at his hole while they continued to kiss, only freezing up for a second before relaxing again. Luke repeated brushed around the rim, causing Ashton to whine and push himself back into Luke’s hand.

Luke giggled quietly, breaking the kiss. “Eager?”

Ashton could have smacked him right then, only giving Luke an exasperated look.

Luke just smiled, finally entering his finger into Ashton who let out a loud gasp. It felt odd at first but Luke immediately pressed kisses all over his neck and collarbones, effectively making Ashton relax again. Luke only began moving his finger again when he was certain Ashton was okay.

It didn’t take long before it started to feel good, Ashton squirming around in Luke’s lap, his cock brushing against Luke’s again and again, relieving him of the overwhelming pressure forming in his belly.

Luke added a second finger, then a third, rendering Ashton a total mess. It didn’t help that Luke never took his eyes off of Ashton’s, his stare driving him completely crazy. After Luke successfully found Ashton’s prostate, it made him shout Luke’s name into his neck, causing Luke to touch the same spot over again.

“God, I’m ready. N-need you now, please,” Ashton mumbled incoherently, not even sure what was actually coming out of his mouth at this point.

Luke didn’t hesitate, probably more than ready for this moment as well. He gently removed his fingers, finding the bottle of lube again before spreading it generously over his own cock. 

“Lift up for me,” Luke requested, Ashton shifting onto his knees while Luke grasped his dick, aligning it perfectly with Ashton’s hole. The head brushed against him, causing Ashton to gasp embarrassingly loud.

“Come on, baby,” Luke whispered, pressing a soft kiss to Ashton’s jaw, the hand on Ashton’s hip pushing him down encouragingly.

Ashton felt Luke fill him up slowly, very carefully. It only caused him a momentary discomfort before Luke bottomed out, filling him up entirely. Ashton let out a shaky breath, continuing to stare into Luke’s eyes up until Luke squeezed his own shut, letting out a low sound from the back of his throat.

“You okay?” Luke finally asked, his voice sounding absolutely wrecked already.

“Yes,” Ashton breathed out, moving his hips a little in test. Luke hissed, his head falling forward onto Ashton’s shoulder. Ashton wasn’t sure if he should continue or not, but once Luke gave his side a gentle squeeze, Ashton took that as a sign.

He rotated his hips again, swiveling a little, feeling a wave of pleasure shoot through him. He did it once more, feeling and hearing Luke groan into his skin.

“Ash,” he whimpered, gripping tightly onto his hips, his fingers digging into his skin. Ashton felt empowered at that moment, loving that he was reducing Luke to this.

He began shifting up and down then, letting himself bounce on Luke’s cock. Luke held on to him tight, pulling back to watch as Ashton moved on top of him. Ashton watched as Luke couldn’t take his eyes off of where they were connected, the other boy biting his lip harshly. Ashton wasn’t having any of that, however, and moved his head forward to slot his mouth onto Luke’s.

Soon enough, Luke was matching Ashton’s thrusts, not content with just sitting still any longer. Ashton was quickly losing all of himself, not even having enough focus to continue kissing Luke. Their mouths stayed on each other’s, breathing harshly as they fucked one another. Ashton felt his hair start to stick to his forehead, and he probably looked like a complete mess, but he couldn’t find it in him to care.

“M’close,” Luke mumbled out, his thrusts getting sloppier as Ashton’s continued at the same pace. Ashton nodded in response, feeling the exact same way, his stomach coiling up in that all too familiar feeling.

It only took Luke wrapping his hand around Ashton’s flushed cock for him to come. He cried out Luke’s name, his eyes fluttering shut as he felt his come sputter out onto his stomach. He felt Luke tenser, Ashton’s name falling off of his lips in a whisper, coming inside of him a second later.

Ashton practically collapsed on top of Luke, the two of them a tangled mess. Ashton felt Luke’s hands rub affectionately against his back, causing him to relax and catch his breath again.

“So good, Ash,” Luke said, one of his hands running through Ashton’s hair. Ashton hummed, pulling back to look at the other boy.

Luke looked completely blissed out, probably matching the same expression on Ashton’s own face. Ashton giggled softly, pressing a gentle peck to Luke’s cheek. He shifted himself off of Luke then, standing up off of the bed.

He felt kind of gross in that moment, which Luke seemed to understand. “Hold on one sec. I’ll go get something to clean us up with.” He got up from the bed and exited out from his room into the hallway. Ashton remained standing, looking around Luke’s room until the other boy returned with a wet towel.

He approached Ashton first, giving him a soft smile before wiping him off. Luke cleaned himself off next, disposing of the towel in his dirty clothes hamper a moment later. He picked up his and Ashton’s boxers, the two boys putting them back on before climbing into Luke’s bed in a fit of giggles.

“I love you,” Ashton said, his arms winding around Luke’s waist as they cuddled into one another underneath the blankets.

“I love you more,” Luke replied, kissing Ashton’s forehead, his hand intertwining with Ashton’s between their bodies.

“No, impossible,” Ashton sleepily mumbled, finding his eyes closing shut as the warmth of Luke’s body against his calmed him down. He was always pretty sleepy after getting off, it was just a simple fact. He couldn’t really help it.

“Shhh,” Luke replied, sounding pretty tired himself.

Ashton and Luke easily drifted off to sleep moments later. Ashton thought they’d have plenty of time to argue over who loved each other more soon enough.

***

“God, you’re so _gross_ , Calum,” Ashton whined, shoving his best friend back into the grass.

“It’s not nice to push, Ashton,” Calum replied from the ground, sticking his tongue out. Ashton rolled his eyes, wiping off the stickiness of the fruit popsicle that Calum had just shoved down Ashton’s singlet.

“Boys, boys. Play nice,” Michael interrupted, approaching the two of them with Luke right beside him.

“You try dealing with this _child_. He’s a handful,” Ashton complained, Luke walking directly up to him, their hands linking together.

“Oh, I know he’s a handful. Believe me,” Michael quipped, causing everyone except Calum to make gagging sounds. Calum just stood up, a huge, goofy smile on his face as he kissed his boyfriend.

“Happy anniversary, babe,” Michael said against Calum’s lips. The two of them tended to get lost in each other pretty easily, but Ashton kind of understood that.

He and Luke both turned around at the same time, heading back toward the swing set at the park they were at, celebrating Michael and Calum’s six month anniversary. Ashton was a bit skeptical on whether or not six months deserved a celebration, but Luke convinced him to go along with it. If Calum and Michael wanted to share this day, or at least part of it, with the two of them, Ashton guessed he was fine with that.

Maybe part of the reason he easily went along with it was because he knew that he and Luke’s anniversary was fast approaching, too. It was entirely too strange to think that it had been that long, but time had gone by really quickly this year in Ashton’s eyes.

Next week, all four of them were headed off to university. Ashton and Luke just so happened to get scholarships to the same places, eventually choosing to go to the same school. Maybe it was a bad idea, going to the same school as your significant other, but Ashton was more than positive that he and Luke were meant to be. He had zero doubts.

Cal and Michael were headed off to a school not far from Luke and Ashton, also opting to head to the same place. It seemed that none of them really wanted to be separated that much. Ashton was trying not to be too bummed that he and Calum wouldn’t be around each other that much, but that didn’t meant they still wouldn’t be best friends.

Luke tugged on Ashton hand, bringing him out of his thoughts.

“What are you thinking about, babe?” Luke asked, bringing Ashton’s hand up to his mouth to plant a soft kiss. 

Ashton sat on the swing, blushing a little at the attention he was getting from Luke.

“You, of course,” Ashton replied, giving Luke’s hand a squeeze.

Luke shook his head bashfully, starting to move back and forth on his own swing.

“I love you so much,” Luke whispered, leaning his head forward to press his lips against Ashton cheek. “Are you excited for next week? I know you said you were a little nervous about it last time…”

Ashton turned to face Luke, shrugging one of his shoulders, smiling softly at the boy. “Yeah, I just don’t want to leave home and Mom and the kids, you know?”

Luke nodded in understanding. Ashton knew he felt the same way about his own family.

“But I’m glad we’ll be going together. I’m still sad our parents wouldn’t let us be roommates,” Ashton said, giving Luke a cheesy smile.

Luke giggled. “They knew better. We’d probably never get up to go to class.”

“You’re not wrong. I would have never let you out of my bed,” Ashton stated, laughing along with Luke.

Luke shook his head. “You’re such a tease.”

Ashton winked, standing up from his swing and moving to stand in front of Luke. He moved his hands to Luke’s face, letting his thumbs rub softly against the boy’s skin. “Come on, I think Cal and Mikey have to be done by now. And I want some cake.”

Luke grinned as Ashton shifted forward to kiss Luke’s forehead, taking the boy’s hand once he stood up. They walked back over to the other two boys, happy to see they had their hands to themselves for once.

Ashton grabbed the two of them some slices of cake, coming back to sit down with everyone else. Luke smiled at Ashton, taking the plate out of his hand, feeding him bites of cake in between laughing and telling stories. Ashton knew there was no way he could have waited for Luke all those months ago and that he honestly was the happiest he’d ever been right now, in this moment. He knew it really couldn’t get better than this.

Luke fed him the last bite of cake, getting a little bit of icing accidentally on the corner of Ashton’s mouth. He shifted forward to kiss Ashton, tasting like fruit and cake. Ashton’s heart skipped a beat, never wanting this moment to end.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading this and i hope you enjoyed it!!!! this is the longest thing i’ve ever written and i can’t believe how much this got away from me! if you want, you can follow me on tumblr [here](http://noahshaw.tumblr.com)!


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